Crystal Heaven
by TheNaiker
Summary: A sequel of the original story of Higurashi. Takano and the Yamainu have been defeated, but happiness is something you always have to fight for.
1. Looking around

_**Author's notes**_

_**I'll write them shortly, I know how much people hate preambles...**_

_**1) I'm Italian, so unluckily English is not my native language. I've checked my work, of course, but please keep yourself from shooting me if you find something wrong :)**_

_**2) If I have time to write it, this will be quite a long story. I don't know how much often I'll update it, it will depend on my free time. I loved a lot of stories here, especially Crimso's ones, but my chapters won't be so long...**_

_**3) If you know about the full original story, you also know that the Sonozaki twins, after June 1983, had to go to their "college", while in my story they are still in Hinamizawa's school. It's the only poetic license I took on purpose. Probably I could write some excuses about it, but I prefer not to write something which could be impossible in Japanese school, so I'm just "forgetting" it. **__**(EDIT: In the review section, they've made me notice that the twins have nearly a year to spend there (Thanks Michael), I will keep it in mind while writing)**_

_**4) In this story there is a couple of Westerners, too (Italians, of course :P). I don't know exactly how studying/working in Japan as stranger works (I read some web page about it, especially having full time jobs in Japanese companies seems quite complicated, however), so I had to be probably imprecise. But after all, they're living in village which has fought against the law and the Dam, so being so strict is maybe even useless... Ah, and of course they all are fantasy names.**_

_**5) That's all. Let's start...**_

_**...**_

**1 – Looking around**

_Hinamizawa, 31__st __August 1983_

"Ouch! Hey, could you drive slower, please? This road is completely ruined!"

Coming from the Sonozaki Manor, a little blue car is going towards the heart of the little village called Hinamizawa. It was nothing special, especially compared to the luxurious ones that often go through that country road. Aboard, a boy was massaging her head, while looking bothered at his older sister, while she was driving.

"You should know I'm already late. We were not supposed to introduce ourselves today."

"I know, but you should organize better your engagements. I don't want to risk my safety because of your lateness."

"To be honest I don't even understand why we had to go there. We were going to meet them elsewhere in a few days, after all. This is another little village, finding someone around is not that difficult!"

The boy sighed "Have you already forgotten what grandpa told us before leaving? This is an unwritten law, here, and that old lady cares it as nothing else... and this is somewhat a way to recognize her authority, just like a king receiving respect from his liegemen. And don't forget that Oryou is quite an old woman, I don't think she spends her day walking through the village. I think it's nice to go to her house and say who we are, where we are from, and so on."

"Hmmm... whatever. I still don't think I'm someone's servant, at the moment."

"And at the moment I don't think it's good to break this kind of rule. That's something purely formal, it doesn't have any real consequences... and just ignoring it is not a good calling card, don't you agree, Flavia?"

Flavia (the young woman who was driving) didn't answer at once. Then she said "It's just because they're the leading family here. If she was a common lady this would have been a nonsense. Shouldn't you go and do the same courtesy to all the families around here, otherwise?"

"You're quite right, but I told you this is a sort of law, and I personally don't have anything against it. However I think I... no, _we _have to do that with the other villagers, starting from our neighbors. We can't stay at home ignoring who lives here, it would be a nonsense. We should have stayed at home, otherwise."

"Even because you can't go unnoticed here, isn't it right, Giancarlo?"

Giancarlo looked at the driving mirror. Yes, she was right. The dark brown hair could be even "normal" here, even if having such a wavy one is not common in Japan. The problem was his face... and not only the one on his shoulders. The villagers, once they had met them, would have immediately understood they were westerners.

"I wonder if Hinamizawa has ever been touched by any other westerner..."

"It's not impossible. Watanagashi is quite a popular festival, and possibly some maniac of Eastern traditions went here in the last years. But I don't think they were common, however... be careful, they are going to focus their attention on you, during the next days!"

Giancarlo looked at her ironically smiling sister, and replied "Why should _I _be the only one? You'll be in the same situation, don't you think?"

"Oh, but I'm ready... and I think I am much more suitable for such a role than you."

He blushed "I can't change my character. I'm not that communicative man, and I'm not a leader... At least not a messy one."

"Ha ha ha, very funny, are you referring to someone?"

"Who knows... Come on, did you really have to tell the Sonozakis we had already gone to Hinamizawa last week, and that we couldn't go to their house because that evening because we all had the flu?"

"But it was true!"

"I know it was true! But saying it was not necessary at all! We've given a terrible impression." Once they arrived in Japan, they stayed some day in a hotel in Tokyo, since they had to wait for the Embassy to give them the proper documents about the change of residency. They had initially decided that only one of them had to stay in the big city, while the others would have moved at once at Hinamizawa, but the flu forced them to stay all together in the hotel, since leaving one or two of them alone and ill in a little village didn't seem a good idea. If it wasn't for the documents, they could have healed also in Hinamizawa. Damn you, bureaucracy.

"But what she said was still true, however. You can't complain because Flavia has told the truth, Nii-chan."

A voice interrupted his thought, and Flavia and Giancarlo turned their heads. Behind them, another girl started talking. The youngest girl of the family. Flavia looked at her only for a second, since she was still driving. Giancarlo could instead think about an answer.

"I know that, Alice. But have you seen them? Oryou and the other woman were very amused because of this."

"And isn't this good?"

"I am not a clown."

Alice sighed "You're always the usual faultless Nii-chan, eh? You should relax, nothing bad happened, as a matter of fact. Moreover, she had to justify why we went to Hinamizawa's school last week without introducing ourselves at the Manor. Had she to tell a lie because of your pride?"

"You're exaggerating now. There's nothing bad if you do that kind of meeting some day after your coming."

"Weren't you the one who was talking about the importance of respecting the Old Good Traditions, before?"

It was Giancarlo's turn to sigh, now. "You're probably right. Ok, I think you've done the right thing, Flavia, let's forget this."

Flavia smiled, amused. Alice, instead, touched his light wavy brown hair, as sign of self-satisfaction.

"I gotcha, Nii-chan! You know, it's not that easy to do that, you're always so twisted and... and... Oh, no, how can you say it in Japanese... when you tell something which has also a deeper meaning..."

"Alice, if you don't know a word, just tell the meaning, or search for simpler words. Obscure here would have been more than enough."

"Hmph, why have we to speak Japanese here? We're among us, we should speak Italian!"

"You are going to get used to it. Firstly, it's a good exercise for you and me. Secondly, when we are with other people we should try not to use it, even if you are speaking to me and vice versa. It would not be kind, they wouldn't understand a word of what we're saying."

"_Stupido fratellino!_" was Alice's answer.

"Indeed, from now you're saying _Stupid Nii-chan_, instead of that".

"If I speak another language, that's because I don't want the others to understand, don't you think it?"

"It's not kind, still. However, it's still a good exercise, as I told you. After all it's the reason we went to Hinamizawa's school, last time."

He was right. Alice and Giancarlo were 18, while Flavia was 27. In Italy they had ended their compulsory school since they were 14, that's why they could move to Japan. But they however had to obtain their diploma, so they had to study another year for it. They decided to do it by "staying at home" (even if they were not at their home actually) and to pass their exams in September, in the Italian school located not far from the Embassy, as external candidates. Not that comfortable, but since they wanted to stay in Japan it was the best choice. And after all they were pretty good students, passing their exams wouldn't have been that problem.

The problem was their Japanese. Flavia spoke a perfect one, but the younger brothers learned it not a long time before, and they needed to improve it. And where else could they do that better than in a school? After having talked by phone with the principal, during the week before they went there in order to test their actual knowledge of the language. Chie-sensei gave them a small test about Hinamizawa's environment, and they had to give them their impressions about it verbally and with a little essay. They got the results a couple of days later, by phone since they had still the flu.

"Giancarlo seems to understand easily what he reads/hears, but when he speaks he doesn't use a large vocabulary and his sentences are maybe too short and succinct. Alice, instead, makes some mistakes and misunderstands some words, but she doesn't fear using terms she just has listened or read. They need some help, but I'm impressed by their level, since they started to learn it only a couple of years". The boy repeated aloud what she said that day, while thinking at it.

"It's not a bad judge at all, I'd say. Learning Japanese is often used as example for something really difficult" said Flavia.

"Well, I'd say it stands for our character, after all." replied Alice "You should be more outgoing when you talk with the others, Nii-chan."

"Yeah, yeah. I know it, it's not the first time you tell me that."

"I only hope" Alice continued "there are some boys with our same age. That would be boring if we were the oldest ones."

"I don't think there are. Here in Japan they go to college when they are 16-17, and that school is definitely not a college. Moreover, that school is attended only by half of Hinamizawa's boys, Chie-sensei told me this year there will be 18 students including us. The other boys goes to Okinomiya's school."

"A real pity. However... only 30, 40 young boys at most, in a village with 2.000 inhabitants? There are so few of them!"

"It's a bit strange, indeed... but aging population is a serious matter, here in Japan, this is not something unexplainable. But I hope at least there are a couple of students aged 16, or 17. Otherwise that would be not only boring...that would be incredibly embarrassing."

"Ah-ah! You will definitely become associate teachers, if that's the case." exclaimed Flavia. "Hey, by the way... What does I only hope there are some boys with our same age means? Are you looking for a new boyfriend? Are you planning to abandon your poor Alberto?"

"Nope!" Alice blushed "What are you saying? He's waiting for me, I couldn't do such a horrible thing! We have to get married soon!"

Soon meant in 3-4 years at least, thought Giancarlo, in that moment her sister was probably too young. But this detail had no importance for Alice, he knew it very well.

"Rather, I was thinking about Nii-chan. If he found someone interesting, who knows..."

"He should hurry, indeed. We can't wait for his laziness. A nice Japanese girl with long black hair, sweet and kind..."

"Have you finished hindering about my life?" he interrupted them "I am not lucky as you, it seems."

Both of the girls sighed "Lucky, he says...". Then Alice continued "At least it would have been nice if the Sonozaki girls were at home..."

"Haven't I told you to stop this..."

"I wasn't thinking about that now, Nii-chan! At least, not only about that. The matter is that knowing one or two of the students before starting school would have been very useful."

She wasn't wrong, this time. "You know, Alice, today is the last day of their holiday, and of our holiday, of course. I suppose they went out somewhere with their friends."

"I wonder where could they have gone. To Okinomiya? At the cinema, maybe?"

"I don't know. Probably they are in a nice place, certainly not, for example, to a tip..."

They laughed, amused by this stupid idea. Playing inside a tip, what an insane idea.

"Ok... we're nearly arrived. Don't you mind if I leave you here? I'm terribly late, and I need the car."

"Well, Flavia... I think there is not any problem. We're not far from home. I only hope our luggage is already arrived."

"Sure, sure, don't worry about it! I've personally taken care of it!". Giancarlo and Alice, instead, were worried. Flavia was quite a messy woman, all their clothes could be in New Zealand right now.

"Ok... See you soon, then." said Alice, while getting out of the car. Flavia waved her hand, then she took her police hooter, she turned it on and she left them, driving terribly fast and laughing crazy. Alice and Giancarlo observed her.

"Fortunately she didn't used it before... You and I might have looked as some dangerous delinquent just arrested, if someone had seen us."

"Don't say that, Alice... Especially to her... She's crazy enough to do really that, next time. Moreover, you know, these country roads are particularly narrow, and that's a further source of risk, if you don't drive carefully. Even if I will have to say this to myself too, I'm not used to left-hand drive and I have to learn quickly..."

"It will be as if we're in England!" answered Alice "However, I don't think Flavia will ever be that irresponsible. She hasn't driven that fast while we were with her. She has been more prudent in order to make sure we wouldn't harm anywhere."

"You're right, I know it, I was just joking before. She is like that since we were little children... Yes, probably acting that rashly is just a role she likes to play, sometimes."

Alice smiled, then she asked: "Well, what do you want to do now?"

"Hmmm... Let's check our luggage, firstly. Then I suppose we'll have to buy something to eat tonight, there won't be any storage at home. Just the most necessary goods, however, tomorrow we'll go to Okinomiya for a larger shopping. It's a bigger city, I suppose that prices will be lower there."

"Okay, Mr. Scrooge. Tonight it will be a good chance to meet most of the villagers at the market, then."

"Oh...Yes. Even if I don't think there will meet thousands of people there, I imagine. I don't think I'm the only one here who doesn't like to throw money off the window, like someone else I know."

"Tsk, since I work money is mine and I have the right to use it how..."

They looked at eachother, and smiled. Rather than a verbal quarrel, it was a game... a way to show and satisfy their ego, after all.

"We don't have time to waste, we are on foot. Let's go then."

"I'd like to have my bike." said Giancarlo "That would have been quite useful here."

"Probably... Well, you can still buy a new one."

"I am fond of my old one, you know. I've used it since... how many years... seven?"

"More or less. When you bought it you were too little for it. You were so funny while you tried to ride on it..."

Giancarlo didn't hear her, or at least he looked so. He was looking at the empty road. Alice noticed it, and she exclaimed "But is there... neither a car?"

"It seems so. You should know that this is something common to all this kind of villages. Moreover, I imagine that nearly all the villagers are still at work now, probably in the fields... today is not hot at all, summer is ending here, and it's just 4 PM. It's a good moment to work while waiting for the evening, that's why we don't meet even a pedestrian." And after that, he commented sarcastically "Flavia's hooter was completely useless..."

"I think she just couldn't wait using it. It's a strong sign of power and authority, its utility is a secondary fact." answered Alice, amused.

"Francesco will be happy when he finally understands what that feeling means for her..." Ignoring what the two brothers were saying about him, Francesco, the man Flavia married just three months before, was arranging their house in Okinomiya. He was lucky, he didn't have the flu like his wife, so he could look after her, during the previous days, and then start attending to the moving towards their new house. In fact, Flavia and him would have lived in Okinomiya, while Alice and Giancarlo would have stayed in Hinamizawa, and their parents had remained in Italy. They were starting an indipendent life.

"Fortunately houses here are quite cheap." he said.

"In country villages it always happens so. Here we are far from big cities, where the most important societies place their offices. In this way the expense was not too big for our parents, and for us. The building we bought is not small at all, it absolutely fits our needs, and is very comfortable, especially considering how much it has cost."

"I imagine they do so in order to appeal new villagers. Depopulation is a constant danger for such communities."

"I agree, Nii-chan. In Okinomiya the situation is already different... Oh good evening!" Alice said to a woman with a child, who had seen them. They were quite surprised to see them, especially the little child, who probably had never seen a Westerner before.

_Yes, it's a good idea to say hello to them_, the boy thought while joining her sister, it's quite early and our house is nearby. _After all, it's a kind thing to introduce ourselves before the first day of school... tomorrow._


	2. At school with youngsters

**2 – At school with youngsters**

_Hinamizawa, 1st September 1983_

"Let's see... Uhm... It's 7:42. It's pretty early... Maybe too early, we could sleep some more minute, this morning."

Giancarlo and Alice were walking through the entrance door of Hinamizawa's school. The first Sun of September was soft, so warm and pleasant, illuminating the main corridor of the building and making the girl feel like a little happy pupil who was coming to school for the very first time... But she thought that sweet atmosphere had been disturbed by her brother's inappropriate comment. So she gazed at him and she complained:

"Nii-chan, you can't be that rigorous. Next time please say _It's 7:40_ or _It's 7:45_, instead of freezing yourself for an hour to read your clock and say the exact time, it's just the same!"

"It's the strength of habit, Nee-chan. But I didn't think it teased you so much."

"Well... No, I don't mind, to be completely honest. The matter is that this behavior is so typical of you. If you did so only sometimes it would be OK, but since you always act so... It's nearly frustrating"

"So it was not a complaint, but an exclamation?" Alice didn't answer. "Well... OK, I'll try to be easier next time. Just don't shout at me if I do it again, changing my habits is terribly difficult for me." he said, while smiling and winking. Alice smiled too, then she asked: "The classroom was...where?"

"It's that room over there, Chie-sensei told us last week."

"Ah, you're right... Should we go there at once or we'd rather wait for the sensei in the teacher's room?"

Good question, he didn't know exactly how Japanese schools worked. He remembered animes where students introduced themselves when the whole class and the teacher were present, but this was a small school, being informal was probably a better strategy. There was nobody in the corridor at the moment, but for sure there was someone in the class, they could hear some voice. "Let's go now, Alice." He said in the end, and they started walking towards the classroom, until Giancarlo stopped, and told Alice to do so too.

"Why?" she asked.

"I changed my mind. Let's wait for Chie-sensei." he said softly. Alice didn't understand why he didn't speak normally, but she knew her brother enough to trust him, and they went towards the teacher's room. They opened the door, and they found Chie-sensei inside.

"Good morning, sensei... We didn't expect to find you here so early." said Alice.

"It's the first day of school, so it's not a common day... Are you fine? It seems you are not ill now."

"Sure. We belong to a family where everyone has a strong constitution! We're made of 100% inox steel!"

"I'm very happy to hear that... But why are you here? I thought you'd gone to the classroom. Just to introduce yourselves, little kids will be very curious."

"We were going to the classroom, indeed, but Nii-chan told me it was better to come here."

Chie-sensei looked curious at Giancarlo, who politely explained: "That wire."

"Which wire?"

"There's a thin wire in the lower section of the door, which goes under the carpet. It's pretty taut and it has been painted with the same color of the basement, which makes it harder to see; if you consider that this building is old but in a good order, you can think nothing but someone has deliberately put it there. Moreover, the wire itself seems new, so it must have happened recently, quite probably very early this morning, since school has been closed in this summer period. Without considering the carpet, which seems to be slightly higher than the basement, probably there's something under it."

"Namely, you have described it as it was... A trap?" asked Alice.

"Yes. Of course, that can be a lot of explanations for that wire, but the first thing I thought..."

In that moment, other students arrived at school. The door was closed, so they couldn't see them, but they could hear their voices.

"Mii-chan, Keiichi-kun, please wait!"

"Ha-ha-ha, sorry, but this old lady can't lose against Kei-chan!"

"It's all useless, Mion, I'm going to wiiiiinnn!"

"Pretty noisy students, I'd say..." commented Alice "However, sensei, I think you have understood how Nii-chan reasons. Few words, very perceptive. And he looks for the worst conclusions. Why should they prepare a trap against us? They hardly know us!"

"I wouldn't know, I said it was only a hypothesis..."

"You should look for a more positive one. Maybe, once you arrive and get into that wire, it will make appear some balloon, and a long banner saying "_Welcome, charming westerner!_", prepared by the local girls..."

Giancarlo sighed, slightly embarrassed and annoyed.

"It would have been a nice event" Chie-sensei interrupted her, "but I think the truth is more similar to what your brother thought."

"Is it really a trap? But why should we des..."

"Wait, I haven't finish. It's probably a trap... But likely you are not its target."

"What do y..."

She was interrupted again, this time by a strong male shout. Alice and Giancarlo went out of the room, without entering the classroom. They could clearly listen to what they were saying, however.

"Satoko, you dirty..."

"Ara ara, Keiichi-san. You didn't remember what this school means for me and you? Won't you ever learn it?"

"When I catch you I'll..."

"Stop, Kei-chan, you're not allowed to deal with her in this way."

"Shion, don't even think to interfere! It's a matter between..."

"I've told you STOP!"

"AAAAARGH! Why did you took that taser here?"

"Don't worry, its tension is not high enough to kill someone. At least the seller had said so."

"What _He said so_? Do you know what happens if he's wrong?"

"Gya-ha-ha-ha!"

"Nippa~!"

"I think I should stop them, this is still a school." said Chie-sensei. "Shall you come with me?"

"S-sure" answered Alice, surprised. Her brother followed them, looking around apparently absent-minded.

While advancing and reaching the classroom, Alice clearly heard the others' voices.

"Hey, they're coming!"

"Let's go, to our desks!"

"I've never seen a foreigner before, that will be great!"

"They really have big noses..."

"It's not kind from you, you have even a bigger one!"

Probably some of the kids had seen them in the morning, or the previous day, and now they had told their classmates every thing they knew: who they were, how many they were, how they look... It was not strange. After all, Giancarlo warned her, the previous evening:

"You know, we are foreigners here, and this is a little village, you know how things work here. Blah blah blah, and by this evening everyone knows the last news better than what television could ever do. Without considering they know about Flavia's role too, after having replaced the old retired inspector she has introduced herself to lots of people, and surely she had talked about us, she's quite outgoing. Seeing us tomorrow won't be a surprise for them, they'll know many more things than what we can imagine."

Alice was slightly annoyed, she'd like to make a big surprise instead. But she could have a little revenge. Just before the door she stopped, and she asked the other to stop too, just like what Giancarlo did 15 minutes before.

"Why...?" started protesting Chie, before being blocked by Alice's "SHHHHH!". Giancarlo said nothing, he had half a mind about her sister's aim. She stopped very next to the door, and she was waiting.

10, 20, 30 seconds passed. An unreal silence ruled in those moments, and nothing happened. Alice was still waiting. Chie decided that was useless, and that she had waited enough. But before she could make a step, something happened.

A young female head appeared from the door. Her long green hair moved as a tail, and this was quite obvious, since Alice and Giancarlo could clearly see her ponytail. She appeared quite annoyed, and in fact she exclaimed: "SO? WHAT THE HELL ARE THEY DOING? HOW MUCH HAVE WE TO WA..."

She stopped, surprised. Her nose, and the western girl's one, were 2 cm far the one from the other. Alice's big eyes were looking at her, greatly amused. She could hardly avoid laughing. Finally she tightened her lips, and she shouted "BUUUU!" The other girl snapped backwards, quite surprised rather than scared, and she kept on looking at her, without knowing what to say. It was Giancarlo who decided to break the silence, then:

"It's quite a trivial joke, don't you think, Nee-chan?"

"Do you always have to comment, Nii-chan? I think it's quite funny, since I couldn't prepare anything special, on the contrary of who placed that wire."

"Wire? Did you see..." the girl asked. Alice nodded, and a little blond-haired girl who was listening the dialogue come out of the room, and exclaimed:

"Ara ara, so the foreigners who arrive here can see such a simple trap, while Keiichi-san can't? Oh, you're such a villain, Keiichi-san..."

"Can't you just stop insulting me?". This should be the boy who screamed before, the voice was similar.

"To be honest this is the second time we've come into this building, but yes, we did." Alice's desire to be in the limelight was quite strong, so the kids coming from the classroom looked admired at her, while her brother became nearly unnoticed. He wasn't unused to such a situation, but he didn't dislike it, on the contrary it allowed it to enter the classroom with some calm. Unfortunately for him, her sister followed him, since she wanted to involve him in that little show.

"So you think it was trivial, uhmmm... But don't you think it's the best way to break the ice when you meet other boys or girls? No formal _Nice to meet you_, nor awful and excessive jokes."

"I'm not sure everyone likes this kind of meeting."

"Of course, but you should analyze the situation! This seems a joyful group of students, you heard about the previous joke they've realized..."

"Herm, by the way, I'm the ingenious creator of it, Copyright 1983" the little girl interrupted her "My name's Houjou Satoko, _Niiiice to meeeeet you!_". She said the last part of her sentence with an altered voice, remembering what had just been said by Alice. Who answered with a genuine smile and a _"Niiiiice to meeeeet you too, Satoko-chan", _said with the same kind of voice.

"So you're saying she found it funny..."

"Yes, I am. You can ask her, if you want to check it."

Sigh. "Is it true, Sonozaki Mion-san?"

The green-haired girl looked at him and answered "Yeah, kind of... HEY, wait a minute? How do you know my name? Aren't you one of those hateful stalkers who ruin the others' life, especially handsome ladies' ones? Heh? What can you say at your excuse? You frightening monster!"

What... an aggressive girl... Another sigh. "Oh man, it's so simple. You should have known we went to your home yesterday, they should have told you, didn't they? And once you meet your mother... Well, it's not that difficult. To a westerner, Japaneses all seem the same, in the beginning, but once you get used to that, you can see the real resemblances."

Sonozaki-san then shouted "It's always the same story! Everyone says _You're just the same_, _You are really her daughter_, _You'll be just like her in a couple of years_... But this old lady will never accept this!"

She seemed to have completely revived, thought Giancarlo while sighing for the third time in a row. Her sister was right, as usual.

Alice went on "There were two Sonozakis, they told us. Then the other one is..."

"...Me." Another green-hair girl, but with loose one. She seemed a lot more calm than her sister, the usual calm and shy Japanese girl, at a first glance. "I'm..."

"Wait a second, Shion." Her sister blocked her. "This dangerous guy still has to explain me how he knew my name. I understand about _Sonozaki_, but _Mion_? Heh?"

"Why don't you try to discover it yourself, then?". Giancarlo started to get really annoyed. "Next time I won't say anything, if this makes you happier." There was no reason to be so aggressive, in his opinion, and he couldn't bear that kind of people. Rude men were one of the very few things which made him lose his temper, maybe the only thing. He wasn't used to raise his voice or be very explicit, even in those cases, but he didn't care about the fact she belonged to the ruling family of the village, this had a little importance for him. After all, even the old Oryou had already noticed that, the previous day, when he had clearly said he didn't agree about an opinion of her. But since he had told it with respect and proper manners, and he had reasoned deeply and carefully his opinion, Oryou didn't get angry that day, on the contrary she seemed quite pleased, and she just said "If you think so!". The only thing which could make him regret those words was that her sister would not have appreciated such an answer to a girl just met, but he couldn't delete what he had just said.

Mion looked at him, thoughtful. Then, before Alice could say anything to repair things, she answered: "Ok, ok, this old lady loyally recognizes her fault, and asks your forgiveness for that. But", she added smiling, "I am still curious about what I've asked you before."

Now it was Giancarlo's turn to look at her, doubtful and thoughtful as well. She was rude in the beginning, but she had apologized. And after all, in Italy they say that answering is courtesy.

"_This old lady..."_

"What?"

"They told us the older of the twins was called Mion. At least, this is what your mother told us yesterday."

"That old woman should shut up sometimes!"

"...Yes. Mion and Shion, and Mion is older, if I can say so."

"I understand now. If Mii-chan was the younger one she wouldn't say _old_, am I right? Am I?"

The foreigners turned towards a girl who hadn't still said anything. She was next to a student with a big bump on his head, probably the one who fell into Satoko's trap.

"Oh, I am Ryuugu Rena, nice to meet you."

"Hi Rena" Alice took again the control of the situation "Yours is a very good reasoning, I think you're right, isn't it true, Nii-chan?" Giancarlo nodded. "So the phenomenon who made this poor figure is..."

"...he's Maebara Keiichi." said Rena. Keiichi was still too depressed to speak, at the moment. "And the girl behind you is named Furude Rika."

"Nippa~!"

Alice looked at the blue haired girl who said that strange word and stayed wordless for some second, before starting to laugh noisily.

"It's marvelous, absolutely marvelous! A nice little girl who says such a lovely word... You should become a mascot, aren't they planning to do the Olympic Games in Seoul, in some year?"  
"I am Japanese, not Korean!" answered the girl, meltingly angry.

"Eh eh. You, instead are...?"

"Not to be rude, Serco-san" Chie-sensei interrupted her" but before going on, you should say your name first."

"Hmm, haven't I said it yet?"

"No, you haven't, Nee-chan."

"You could tell me before, Nii-chan! You always cause me poor figures!"

Giancarlo sighed, while her sister went towards the center of the room, theatrically, and she started speaking.

"Hi, I'm going to introduce myself in the Italian way, which means telling my first name first. I'm Alice Giorgia Serco, but you can call me just Ali-chan. I'm 18 years old and, as my name can make you think, I'm from the far Italy. And – I think you could be interested in this – I already have a boyfriend, so I can't accept flower bunches from any of you."

The whole class started laughing amused, even Keiichi regain his good mood. The only one who didn't laugh...well, it was her brother.

"Why has she to say this every time she meets someone...?", he complained while putting a hand on his face. Some second later, however, he saw how the others started talking to her pleasantly, and he smiled. It's a quick and effective way to make new friends, so probably she acted in the right way.

He was looking still at her, when he felt a hand leaning on his shoulder. It was the pony-tailed girl, once again, who, placed behind him, was keeping her arm all around his neck, just like he was a hostage. She kept him in this way some second, and, when Giancarlo had sat down on the nearest chair without freeing himself from her, she smiled pleased, and she started speaking.

"Hey, young man, you've still not told us your name. Or do you just prefer to stay anonymous, to commit some cruelties and not pay the consequent punishment?"

"I am not a burglar!"

"I was thinking about something worse than a simple thief...Are you a serial Killer, maybe? The so-called Ripper of the Setting Sun?"

"Like if someone with this name exists!"

"He doesn't exist... until now!"

"What..."

"Come on, Nii-chan, you should answer to a nice girl who demonstrated such a care towards you." Alice looked at them, amused. It was important, for his brother, to settle there in the right way, and that seemed a really good start... Giancarlo, aware of all the meanings of her sister's exortation, decided to stand up, but immediately he changed his idea, so he stayed sat and he started talking:

"O-OK... My full name il Giovanni Carlo Serco, but they usually shorten it by calling me Giancarlo. You can call me...well, Gian-kun? No, it doesn't work... So..." Before meeting them, he didn't think about a proper nickname, as Alice did. She always thinks about every detail, when she has to make new friends.

"Hmmm... What about Gi-chan?" said Rika, who had not said anything and was just looking at the scenario. Giancarlo thought some second about it, then he answered:

"Yes... It doesn't thrill me, but I think it's the least ugly nickname..."

"What about Gaijin-kun, then? If you don't like Gi-chan?" said the girl behind him

Giancarlo looked at Mion, but he wasn't angry, this time. Just curious.

"Isn't Gaijin an offensive word towards me? I know to come from abroad, but..."

"And isn't yours an offensive behavior towards us? You refused our gentle friendship, our great and dispassionate offer, on the contrary of what your sister does."

"I am not refusing it! Just I've a different character. I don't like be a _prima donna_, just like her. Call me Gi-chan if you want, I just must get used to it."

"OOOOOOKKKK! Gi-chan approved! An important step of your sojourn in Hinamizawa has been accomplished, now!"

"That's good. Ah, another thing..."

"Sure, Gi-chan. Every thing you want. Tell me, tell me."

"Could you... please... leave me? You're choking me!"

"Ops, sorry! You are not a strong and outstanding guy however, I'd say..."

"In Italy we'd call him a _library mouse_, a bookworm namely. He always preferred books rather than open air." exclaimed Alice.

"You can't make this a fault, Nee-chan. It's been my choice." Alice, as answered, sighed, and Mion exclaimed:

"You both like sighing, I see...But whatever, this has no importance. So, Gi-chan, we are officially friends now, this rite has been concluded. Have you anything to add, Gi-chan?"

"...No... so I can say we are friends... Sonoz... Mii-chan, I meant"

"Ok, good. Let's go now. Chie-sensei is getting irritated. It's the first day of school, but, as the name says, it is a day of school!"

"Yooo!" said all the others, before sitting at their desks. Chie-sensei showed to the young Sercos their places, and while sitting, far from the others, Alice softly told his brother:

"You know, after that girl took your with her arm, I was quite sure that you'd have rebelled and asked her angrily _What are you doing?_. You know, a couple of minutes ago you had not a nice dialogue, and I know you hate too aggressive people..."

"Nee-chan...To be honest I thought to do so, for a second."

"Really? So why..."

"When she took my shoulder she didn't use much strength...her arm was really only reclining on my shoulder. She had arrived there, but she said nothing in the beginning. And she was not smiling. Without considering she is pretty shorter than me: to hold me in that way, I imagined she had to stay on her tiptoe."

"It's true, you're the tallest here, after all we're older than them..."

"And Japaneses are not certainly famous because of their height."

"Hmmm... Wait, so this is why you have sat on that chair? In order to... Help her keeping her arm in that position?"

"That position was quite uncomfortable for her, I don't think she did so for fun. If she really wanted to tease me she could do something much simpler for her."

"...So?"

"I...I thought she did that not as sign of aggressiveness, but because she would see my reaction, my behavior towards her." He stopped speaking for some second, then he added another thing. "She didn't tell a word in that moment...but I was able to turn lightly my head, maybe she even didn't notice I saw her face, and her look...her eyes didn't seem to belong to a happy teaser. They seemed to say something else."

"Which was...?"

"_Please, don't hate me..._"

Alice looked at him, and then she concluded: "So she started laughing and whatever else only after having checked you were not turning her away, that is what you're saying..." Some second passed, then she went on speaking. "You'll be always my usual strange Nii-chan...". Then they opened their books, and they started their exercises.


	3. Backgrounds

**3 – Backgrounds**

_Hinamizawa, 1st September 1983_

"Nii-chan, please what do these Kanji characters mean? I don't think to have ever seen any of them."

Alice was looking at the complex text Chie-sensei asked her to read and understand, which would have been evaluated thanks to the resume she was writing. It was not such a long one, probably her brother would have finished it in an hour, but it came from a technical book, which was full of difficult and specific meanings about the laws of hydrodynamics. Normally, since it was not a math exercise, Giancarlo wouldn't have been allowed to help her excessively, but it was still the first day of school, so the sensei gave him the permission. And, after all, Giancarlo had some work to do too, writing an essay where he had to explain differences and similarities between Henri Louis Bergson's and Nishida Kitaro's views of the ethereal world, being as understandable as possible. Of course Chie-sensei gave him a couple of books in order to learn the subject, but it was still a philosophical matter which needed a lot of long and exacts sentences, articulated in the proper way and with the use of the most suitable words. Once she knew the subject, for Alice it would have been easy to write it, underlining the most important parts. Unfortunately, or maybe fortunately, they had to do something they were not that good at, forcing them to work hard during all the morning. Their whole work of that morning, after all, was a first test to see their improvements after that Chie-sensei said them their lackings, before having better and more specific lessons and exercises.

At last, Alice finished. Firstly, he looked at her brother. He looked quite tired, but, when he noticed she was looking him, he smiled satisfied. Very probably he was going to finish it too, just before lunch break. Then, she looked around, observing the whole classroom. Silence was nearly total, as they were not in a classroom with kids. She saw Chie-sensei helping a group of 4-5 students, including Rika and Satoko. Six more kids were studying in another group, not far from her, while the older students' one was on the opposite corner. The sight of Keiichi, while he was driven crazy by the other girls, made her smile. She'd like to laugh, but in that way she'd have destroyed that atmosphere, and disturbed the others. She went on looking around, until Chie-sensei went to their desks.

"Have you finished, Serco-san?"

"Yes, I have, luckily... And you, Nii-chan?"

"Just a moment... I just want to be sure... This should be good... OK, I'd say it's over."

"Very good. Could you give me your notebooks, then?"

After having taken them, the sensei went towards Keiichi and the older students, while Giancarlo closed his eyes.

"I'm not that good in writing that kind of texts... But I think I will have to get used to them..."

"You wanted your bike, now learn how to ride it. You wanted to go and live in Japan, now learn its language properly." Her brother didn't answer, he knew she was right. And he was also relieved when he heard he wasn't the only complaining one. Not far from her, two girls with green hair were shouting about math and who had created it.

"That can't be possible! These X all over the page... What is this, a students book or a porn magazine?"

"Shouting that way won't help, Mion. You will have to finish them, willing or unwilling."

"Kei-chan, you can't be serious! A nice lady is complaining about problems of her scholastic life and this is all you have to say?"

"...Hmmm. Yes."

"You dirty criminal! You'd deserve that someone kicks your ass until the end of this infamous world! Today you will start our activities with a painful handicap, so next time you will change your mindset!"

"No, you can't do this!"

"Yes, she can." answered Shion "She's still the leader of the club."

"But she can't do this! Even in todays' monarchies kings and queens' power has some limits! Everyone has a Parliament, everyone has a Constitution who tells and establish every citizen's rights!"

"This means my club is NOT like a modern kingdom. Its ruler has unlimited powers, and this old lady is resolved to use it to demonstrate the strength of her actual role!"

The other students couldn't do without looking at them, laughing, and even the Sercos were observing the scene. They were reflecting about what they had been told about Japanese students, who were not said to be usually so wild. But evidently the ones in front of them didn't meet what the common stereotypes said. Well, whatever. Giancarlo put his pen in his bag, hoping not to have to write anything else for the rest of the day, and then he noticed Rena coming to their desks, politely smiling.

"I wonder...do you want to eat with us? Do you?"

"It's a nice ide..." answered Alice, while looking the others taking some box from their bags, and turning hastily pale like a sheet.

"AAAAAAAAARGGGGHHHHH!"

Her peremptory scream filled the air of the room, and hit the students' souls. The windows shook, the crows flew away fearing an attack by some enemy, the cicadas stopped crying. Everyone looked afraid at Alice.

"What's the matter, Serco-san?" asked one of the younger kids.

"My bentoooooo!"

Giancarlo sighed, and opened his bag.

"Your bento? What's happened to..."

"I forgot iiiiiittttt! In Italy we were used to finish school at 1:30 PM, and then we went directly home. I hadn't either thought that here I'd need to bring my lunch from home!"

"It's a real problem." exclaimed Satoko "I suppose this is what happens when you arrive to a country whose culture and traditions are completely different from yours."

"I know, I know! I thought I've considered every detail yesterday, a nice school dress, a proper introduction, the right books to bring... How can this have been happened?"

Giancarlo took a little metal box, dark blue coloured, and he leaned it on his desk.

"Now what can I do? I just can't skip lunch, I won't arrive alive at the end of this day, I'm going to die from starvation! And I even can't use our car, Flavia took it this morning. How can I avoid this ugly fate now?"

"It's not problem! Like when I showed to Rika some month ago, I'll show you how to break this fate!"

"Keiichi-kun, I wonder, I wonder, what if, as sign of friendship, today we all share..."

Giancarlo took a second metal box, red coloured, and he gave it to Alice.

"Next time" he said "please think about it. You just can't forget such an important thing."

Alice looked tearing at him, and then she shouted "Nii-chan, my little lovely provident Nii-chan! Thank you! Thank you!", while hugging him heartily.

"Ehm, you're welcome, but now I'd be hungry, let's start eat without wasting time with these effusions, Ok?"

All the students then moved their desks, in order to create a circle, and they start to eat. Alice was the last to start eating, but she finished it before the others. She was really hungry, and Giancarlo's bento was pretty tasty, even if it doesn't look showy. Ordered and essential, as who made it.

"So have you made it yourself, Gi-chan?" asked Rika, approaching them. "Have you made the bentos for both of you?"

"Yes... I know my sister enough to forecast such situations, you know." Alice smiled slightly embarrassed.

"Ara, I had never thought boys could be able to cook. Once you see that peasant's dangerous experiments you think it's the same for all of them."

"Satoko!"

"Don't bully her, and finish eating, Kei-chan."

Keiichi really seemed the decoy of the group, guessed Alice. Then, when she saw everyone had finished, stood up and moved her desk again. The whole class cleaned the room, and then Mion made an announcement:

"Listen to me, guys. Chie-sensei had to go to Okinomiya, so there is not any lesson this afternoon. If you want you can go home, _but" _and she underlined that word "you'd better stay here, since we have to make some question to _these fellows_!". She pointed the couple of new students, then she took three chairs, and placed two of them in the middle of the room, and the third one a couple of meters far from them. She sat down on this last one, taking a written sheet of paper from her pocket, and the she asked them.

"Sit down, and let's start our little interview."

Alice seemed surprised by all that arrangement: "What's this, the _Maurizio Costanzo show_?"

"The _what_?"

"Alice, you shouldn't talk about something they don't know before you explain to them what it is..." then Giancarlo continued "Do you know about a man called David Letterman and his TV show?"

The others looked each other, then Satoko answered "Well... No. I supposed we all watch only Japanese TV..."

"I understand..." Giancarlo knew nothing about Japanese TV, he couldn't name a similar show to make them understand "Oh, well, it has no importance, just imagine this is a talk show cast by some channel."

"Good, let's play its opening then... TA-TA-TAAAAAAA-TA-TA-TAAA-TA-TAA-TAAAAAAAAAAAA!"

The others laughed, Alice too. Giancarlo looked at Mion still doubtful. "That's a very poor one. No drum? No piano?"

"Nope, this is a little broadcasting company, we have to save as money as possible. Whatever, here they are, our guests, Alice and Giancarlo Serco. Coming from Italy, and more exactly from..."

"...Serco."

"..."

"I thought you spoke a better Japanese. I haven't asked your surname, but your birthplace."

Alice and Giancarlo looked at each other, then the girl answered.

"And our birthplace is called Serco, too."

Some second of silence. Then Mion exclaimed, acting as extremely shocked:

"I knew that! You're the leading family of your village! And your power is so strong that you forced to change the name of the village itself! Oh my goodness, you are planning to invade us? To extend your dominions and phagocytize this country? We are ready to defend us, the famed Hinamizawa's Spirit will strike once again!"

"Can't you stop to say such nonsenses, Mii-chan? We're just a normal family. This matter of names is just a coincidence, or, better, I suppose our surname comes from the village name, and not the opposite as you say."

"Oh? I understand. Yes, making the others calling me _"Hinamizawa Mion"_ and traveling around the world could give the village some good advertising."

"You are not that important, Mion..." observed Keiichi.

"Do you think so? Well, I could do something important then. Something who could make me famous, and so the village. Who knows..." the way Giancarlo was looking at her make her understand it was better to change the subject.

"Yes, I should not be the center of this interview, I am a valuable and objective journalist."

"I never heard of a city named so." spoke Keiichi "So is it a little village, as Mion imagined...?"

"You're right" it was Alice's turn. "It's a little village on the Alps. It's even more little than Hinamizawa, there are... 500 inhabitants, I believe."

"So you're not city boys like Kei-chan, aren't you?"

"Nope. Our villages are 20.000 km far... But I can even say that Hinamizawa and Serco are more similar rather than Hinamizawa and Tokyo. People's mindsets have quite a lot of similarities, I've seen."

"Which means that settling in here will be not so difficult for you. Last year it was a pain to teach Kei-chan... Good, very good, this really delights this old lady."

Kei-chan protested, and he started arguing with Mion, while Giancarlo was looking at them. _We're older than you. If you are an old lady, then explain us what we are now,_ he thought. So he sighed, another time, but Mion didn't noticed it since she was busy because of Kei-chan. Finally she stopped, noticing that the interview would have never come to the end, otherwise.

"OK, so... What should I ask you... Ah, that's right. Alice said she was 18, but you've not told us your age, Gi-chan. Are you older than her?"

"No."

"Oh, so you're younger?"

"...No."

Some other second of silence. After all, that couple really seems interesting.

"...No, aren't you telling you too are..."

"...Twins. Yes, we are twins too."

"Ara ara, this really is what I could call a nice coincidence!"

"But... But... But that's impossible! You are completely different! Height, sex, look, hair, behavior, character... I couldn't even tell you're brother and sister, if you hadn't said it!"

"Never heard about _heterozygous_ twins? It's just like being normal brothers. You're not supposed to be identical."

"But still you have no similarities!"

"It's not true, Mi-chan. Look at my face and Nii-chan's one"

Mion looked carefully at them. Yes, Alice was right. Their eyes were just the same. Big, round, light brown colored, just like some hazelnut. A wonderful color, indeed, she thought.

"But yours look slightly darker than his, Ali-chan, thay are not the same."

"You're wrong, it's only an optical effect. My hair is very light brown, while his is dark brown. So, when you observe me, you think my eyes are darker because you compare them with my hair, and, on the contrary, his look lighter. But in reality we have simply the same eyes. We are just like people who make them photograph with a very short friend, to look taller..."

"Hmm, I see... You've got a point, but... Who is the older one, then?

"To be honest it hadn't had a great importance for us, since Flavia is still the eldest, and Nii-chan would be however the only male son, but, if I well remember...yes, I must be one who went out first, _technically_."

When she heard the word _technically_, Rika raised her head towards Alice, curious, but everyone was now asking about Flavia, and Alice told her she was their eldest sister, and she was the woman who replaced the retired Inspector Oishi. Mion was already informed about her, as her role as heiress of the Sonozaki family required, and she commented ironically:

"An Italian woman... There are a lot of good Japanese officers here..."

"Flavia is Japanese." Of course, when Mion's sentences were more sarcastic, it was Giancarlo's turn to answer.

"Really?"

"Yes... Her husband and she took the Japanese citizenship a couple of months ago, otherwise she wouldn't have been able to work in the police, which was her dream. She's been here in Japan with some family friends since she was 16, she studied here, she made the procedure as every other officer, and she's a real leader, someone absolutely suitable for that job. I don't see why should she be excluded. Of course, as the law asks she got even a new Japanese name... Asuko, or Atsuko, well, something similar. However it's only a name she uses it for official documents, even in the police station they all call her friendly Flavia-san."

"I've heard that the documents told she was named Keresana-san, indeed."

"That's the name of our family friend, in fact. But, what kind of documents are you talking about?"

"Oh, this old lady's role makes her be always informed about these kind of news, it's nothing special. I'll remind my uncle to call her Serco-san then, too..."

"Uncle?"

"...Nothing really interesting. So you've been here since you were little children, too, it seems... Then formally are you Japanese too?"

"Hey, wait a second. It's not the first time we've come to Japan... But we didn't live always here. Our first time was when we were 6 and we stayed in Tokyo a couple of years. We came here with all our family, Dad works as sales director for a little Italian cotton mill. They produce high quality shirts and such stuff, and they seem to have quite a high percentage of sales in this Country, that's why he came here with all of us, in that period."

"That one was a business trip, namely. Why did he bring you too?"

"Well... I think we were there as apprentices, in that period. Actually the factory owner is an uncle of ours, once we were grown up we were supposed to work there too. And this is not said not to happen, as a matter of fact."

"And you..."

"Personally I think Alice is much more suitable for such a job, she's a communicative person. Once she got married, there is a concrete change she'll definitely move in Japan. After all, during the first time we went here in this country, also our sister Flavia has gone to a Japanese college, where she met another Italian boy and she fell in love with him. She was happy together with him, so she decided to stay here, when our parents brought us back in Italy. She was 18 that time, she had the right to act so after all, and our parents hadn't anything particular against it."

Alice blushed, Giancarlo continued.

"Ours will be a sort of part time job, however. Customers phone to Dad in Italy, who organizes a meeting, usually in the afternoon. We both were taught properly, I'd say, so these are tasks which can be made by both of us, and while one goes to the meeting, the other can stay home. Furthermore Dad explained us it's not hard, last time he went to Japan he had only a real meeting every 10-12 days, more or less. Fortunately here customers don't complain that much, and they are used to read booklets carefully enough. As reward for the job, uncle's company gives us a small salary, globally they pay both of us nearly the 50% of what they give to Dad. It's also a way to afford the expenses of this trip, we don't have any particular financial problem but surely we are not the Rockefeller family.

That's why we started studying Japanese, a couple of years ago. When we were 6 and we came here we didn't understand a word of it, we studied in the little Italian school next to the Embassy. But we had to learn it, if we wanted to come here alone, do you understand?"

"But so" asked Rika "you come here, without your parents, just to help your family's factory? But why didn't you go to Tokyo, then? Isn't there another reason why..." she seemed really interested about this question, so Alice winked and said:

"Consider that our main customers are located in Krinoto, it's not that far from here. Tokyo was even farther from there, paradoxically. However, work is not the only reason, indeed. First, Flavia was sent here as inspectress, and living not far from her is pretty nice, I'd say. Moreover, there was someone we wanted to see, some old good friend who lived in Okinomiya."

"Which is...?"

"Sorry, we won't tell you. It's privacy matter, you know."

"I'd find them easily, you know, this old lady still is a Sonozaki..."

"I won't let you avoid this effort, if you want to meet them, _milady_. Even if I tell you not to expect to run into some incredibly famous character, they're ordinary people." Giancarlo thought that Mion was not that acute, she probably hadn't noticed she had even told their surname, before.

"But then... It seems you're going to stay here for a short time, am I wrong, am?"

"Maybe, but it depends on what you mean for _short time_... Our student visa allows us to live in Japan and do part-time jobs for the next two years, actually. We're staying here until next Watanagashi for sure, we were told something about this place. After that... I don't know. Staying here for a longer period would mean thinking about some important project about our future life, and we should inform about authorizations. Moreover, actually Flavia is going to go and stay in our house, once we leave, so we should think about this matter too... who knows what could happen... Now, other questions?"

"Say something in your language!"

Everyone laughed, and they started say:

_"PIZZA!"_  
_"MANDOLINO!"_  
_"SPAGHETTI!"_  
_"MAMMA MIA!"_

The Sercos looked at them wordless for some second, then Giancarlo said:

_"Sti s'cècc che'l ga nià da capì che òla lengua l'è mia sèmper chéla che'l dise do la tele..."_

_"__Ada, Giancarlo"_ answered Alice, amused, ___"te ghe mia da cumpatì sti porécc, che'l sarà mia pusibèl che'l sanno sti laur. Naaa, il ga da dir noter..."_

_"__Dighét del bù?" _

It was their turn to laugh now, while the others, shocked, were wondering what they had just said, and what language they had used. Giancarlo looked at Mion, satisfied since he had silenced her that way, then he explain:

"When a foreigner thinks about Italian language, he usually thinks about Alberto Sordi's movies, or Totò's ones, or about the stereotypes coming from America. Namely, they think about dialects coming from the Southern Italy: Naples, Rome, Palermo...but there is also this kind of dialects, the ones coming from the Alps."

"This concept is just what we just said in our dialect" added Alice "it's just like thinking all the Japaneses are samurai, including kids, 90-years-old men and so on."

"GWAHAHAHAHAA! Very interesting, we've collected a lot of news about our next opponents! Be prepared then, next time we could use all this information against you." This girl never seems to surrender.

"Are you saying our interview is over, namely?"

"Sure. Each TV program has a time limit, and respecting it allows the advertising to be cast properly, which means more money for the owner, and more success for the announcer. You're allowed to go, if you want."

"Ok", said Alice, "to be honest we do have something to do, I think we must hurry. See you tomorrow, then." Alice ran out of the building, dragging her brother.

"It's already 4 PM, the earlier we arrive there, the better!" said the girl, running towards home. She knew Flavia was there with their car, waiting for them, so she ran as fast as she could. Behind them, a rock, big as a human fist, was falling onto the path, probably coming from the escarpment above.


	4. Old friends, new friends

**4 – Old friends, new friends**

___Okinomiya, 1__st __September 1983_

"Please tell them I'm looking for a place where I can park, I'll be back in a couple of minutes." Giancarlo closed the door of the car, and her sister and he watched Flavia going away temporarily.

"Fortunately she didn't use her hooter, this time." Alice said.

"I bet a coffee that yesterday some of her superiors made her some annoyance because she used that, and so they made her lose her desire to use it..."

"Do you think so?"

"It's possible. If she was trickier she'd turned it down a couple of minutes before arriving at the prefecture, but I don't think she's that smart."

"Hmmm... You said you're betting a coffee... We'll ask her later, after all we are in the right place to pay your bet, if you're wrong."

Giancarlo looked at the ensign next to the door. _The Hidden Cove – Cafe_. The name suggested a lair full of pirates, he thought. He opened the door, he keep it firm to let Alice enter, and he entered. And he changed idea about the place.

It was a very calm place, as the apparence from the outside suggested. Half a dozen of tables, and a not so long counter. A very small café, but the limited size was not a problem, since there were only four customers, who were drinking a coffee or reading the local newspaper. A couple of open windows were not able to enlighten completely the hall, but the resulting effect was not disagreeable at all. It seemed a room like the ones of the English 19th Century, or at least like the ones he read about in Sherlock Holmes's books. And, just like Sherlock Holmes did, the old man who was going towards them was smoking a pipe.

"Alice-chan, Giancarlo-kun. I couldn't wait for your arrival!"

"It's a real pleasure, Keresana-san. We've not seen you for years."

"You both seem so grown, I'm so glad you're fine. Instead I was not so lucky, I'm getting quickly older, but after all I guess it's something normal, and this cafe clearly shows its owner is not a youngster. But please, take a seat. Noriko, the usual coffee for me and... what do you want? Of course it's on the house."

"Thank you, then some hot chocolate for me, please!" answered Alice

"...and coffee without sugar for me, instead." chose Giancarlo. Who added "but we should wait for Flavia and Francesco too, they should be here in some moment."

The married couple arrived some second later. Flavia ordered a piece of cheesecake, since she had skipped lunch due to the hard morning at work, while her husband asked for a coffee with brandy. All of them got soon what they had ordered, and then Kogorou Keresana started speaking:

"You really don't know how I am happy to see you again all together, after all this time. You remind me the times I was in Tokyo, and I was still young and strong..."

"You were already 60 in those days", remembered Noriko, his wife. They sat on the nearest table to the counter, so she could join the conversation while preparing a Bloody Mary for one of the customers. "You retired just after they went back to Italy, and then we moved here to open this little haunt, do you remember?"

"You could avoid reminding me I'm 70 now!. Everyone's real age is the one he senses, don't you know that?".

"Considering how much you usually complain, you must think to be 970, then..."

Just one year more than Methuselah, so she was saying he was the oldest man who has ever lived on the Earth. Giancarlo loved the way Noriko jeered his old husband. She had an incredibly deep knowledge of many subjects, she probably had read thousands of books during her whole life. And she spoke a lot of languages, just like her husband. Now, since the Keresanas had gotten old, their memory started to weaken, and their Italian was worse than the Sercos' Japanese, which become then the language of their conversation.

The first time he went with his family in Japan he couldn't speak their language, so he couldn't understand what the others were saying, and in the little Italian School in Tokyo he wasn't able to make the other students friends, since they all were at least two or three years older and they didn't even consider her sister and him. Meeting a family who could speak Italian became a sensational discovery for him, and fortunately the Keresanas took a liking to those who were, in that period, a couple of little kids. Noriko was sterile and they hadn't sons, so they started considering Alice and Giancarlo as adoptive nephews. And Kogorou's wife loved enjoying the kids by making little and brilliant jokes and trivia to her husband. But she loved him deeply, even in that moment, it was obvious once you noticed how they looked at each other, and how Kogorou accepted her wife's tricks. Giancarlo thought theirs was the ideal life as a couple.

Noriko's influence on my character must have been incredibly high, he thought, while finishing drinking his coffee. Then he remembered he had to tell them something:

"Keresana-san, I was forgetting...Grandpa thanks you for all the books and documents you suggested for his research about Hinamizawa... how could you know about all those sources? It took us months to read them all." Their grandfather couldn't read Japanese, so it was Alice and Giancarlo who did it for him, while learning it. They could say those books were a sort of exam, since they were the first complex japanese texts they read.

"Hehe, Noriko helped me a lot...But it wasn't that difficult. Hinamizawa had become quite famous in these last years because of all those recent events. You should know them."

"First the Dam War... and then Oyashiro-sama's curse. Yes, we read it. It seems nobody got killed this year, however. Have they caught the serial killer?" Of course, he didn't even considered the option about it being a real curse.

"The case seems closed, or going to be closed", answered Flavia, "even if I don't know all the details. This case has been taken by Okinomiya prefect himself, who has asked only for Oishi-san's help."

"Has he asked for help...to a retired policeman? And Oishi-san has accepted...for free, I imagine."

"It seems so. They seem to be very close friends."

"Maybe we could go to that club where the play mahjongg, we could find him there." noticed Alice "Hadn't you said he was keen on it once, Onee-chan."

"Alice, even if he's not a policeman any more he just can't talk about open cases to the first girl he runs into..." Alice understood hers was not a good idea, then Giancarlo went on speaking "Probably, since the prefect is involved in the inquiry too, even Flavia could not be allowed to know all the details."

Flavia nodded and added "But consider that only two people are currently investigating, if the case had been harder the prefect would have asked for many more men. Probably they have still not closed the case, otherwise they could have announced the culprit's name, but they are going to do so."

"The prefect belongs to Sonozaki family, you know it" said Keresana "and in the last years someone thought that family was the real culprit. Here in Okinomiya we even saw once Oishi-san declaring it publicly, and accusing them. And now they are such friends, this is not a normal world..."

Giancarlo thought about it for some second "There was not any Sonozaki in the list of murdered, while there were some of the Dam Supporters... Hmmm...No, they couldn't... That would have been a nonsense."

"What do you mean, Nii-chan?"

"If I were them and I wanted to kill them, I would not get rid only of a couple of people every year. I'd have killed them at once, like in St. Bartholomew's Night massacre for example, and then claim it was Oyashiro-sama's curse as well. It's less theatrical, but you receive attention from the media for a shorter time, and there is a minor chance to making any mistake, since you have to act only once. When we meet them yesterday they didn't seem stupid at all, I'd say."

"Who do you think was the culprit like?" asked Keresana-san, pleased and amused by that kind of speech.

"Well...as said, killing in that way raises media's attention more...probably it's a stupid wretch with some exhibitionist mania and maybe some mental disturb..."

"Oh my god, you're so cynical, Giancarlo!" exclaimed Flavia's husband, and they all laughed.

"By the way...your grandfather still has not told us why he needed all those documents. What kind of research...?"

"Ahh..." answered Alice "Nothing particular. He just wanted to know as many things as possible about the place we were moving. He didn't want us to be unprepared."

"But... He had asked for all those books! Hasn't he exaggerated?"

"Grandpa ALWAYS exaggerates!" exclaimed Flavia "He wanted to know Life, Death and Miracles of everyone in that village, as we say in Italy."

"Legends are nice to read, even if a bit scary," went on Alice "but not as useful as actuality, and description of the lore and habits. He was incredibly precious for us, for example, since Nii-chan was talking about our visit to Sonozaki's manor, if it weren't for you we wouldn't even have known it was a good habit to go and see Oryou-sama directly in her house."

"I'm glad I was so helpful, but...". Their conversation went on. The Keresanas started talking about what they did after their Italian friends left, and Flavia explained why her parents were not with them. Alice quickly finished her hot chocolate, earlier in order to talk she had stopped to drink it, and now it was starting to get colder. Instead, while listening to the others, Giancarlo was absently looking at the light coming from the window and arriving on the wall, as reflecting about God knows what. The look of the luminous shape was quite well-outlined, because of the setting sun whose rays hit directly the window, with some more irregulars limits on its lower part. Just like there were flowers on the window. Giancarlo stood up, went towards Noriko, and he asked her for something slowly.

...

"Mii, where do you think he's gone, now?"

Spying from a window is always hard. From outside the Cafe they couldn't see much.

"How can I know it, it's difficult to see something in this way! And I heard neither a word, these damn Italians seem not to be used to talk loud as I had imagined."

"Why should they scream, I wonder, I wonder..."

"I must have seen a movie about them, so I was sure..."

"If your knowledge of real life is based on movies, you have serious problems, Onee.."

"Hmmm...Whatever. I'd say he could have gone to the bathroom, he must have asked for it to that woman."

"Next time I will design a periscope..."

"Finally a good idea, instead of keeping on making those traps!"

"How dare you? Next time you're tasting what I've prepared for you!"

"However, I don't think it will take too much time for him to come back, men don't care even about washing their hands!"

"It's not ..."

"Oh my god, Rena has understood!" The others turned towards her.

"We are in danger, we are. We must hide som..."

"It's too late, milady."

The whole club had frozen, because of the dark aura they could clearly perceive behind them. Their heart stopped beating, their breath became wheezy. A terrible fate was waiting for them.

"What-are-you-do-ing-here?"

"I knew it was not a good idea, you stupid peasant..." cried Satoko, while Keiichi tried to justify the others and himself:

"Ehm...Giancarlo-sama, you know...today's activity was an accelerated spy course, and in order to gain our diploma we had to follow someone without being noticed...and since it seemed a good idea to follow some nice pleasant and just met boy in order to..."

"Oh, really?" he answered, evilly smiling, and starting approaching at them.

"W-what are you planning to do now? T-there are girls and little children here and you could be charged of..."

Giancarlo didn't answer, still smiling and walking.

"W-w-w-what do you want to do?"

"If I know him well enough, nothing."

The surrounding dark aura disappeared, and the disappointed Italian boy looked at the opening door.

"Flavia!"

"Well, it's true!" she answered laughing "You can't deny it. Or are you saying to a police officer that you were going to commit a crime?" Then to the others "I just think he wanted to cause you just a little fear, just to say after that _Uh uh, that was a joke!_..."

"I wouldn't use that kind of words, I'm not such a young child..."

A couple of seconds passed. Shion got surprised, she expected one of the other members of the club, especially her sister, gave him a whack on his head saying "Don't try this again! This is a formal and important club activity and you are not supposed to block it!" or something similar. It was Rika who spoke, instead:

"Gii, how have you seen us? You were not looking at the window, your head was in the opposite direction..."

"It must have been something related to the light coming from it. He was looking there." Alice had gone out the cafè and reached the group. Everyone looked at Giancarlo, waiting for explanations.

"The lower side of that light was not a definite straight line, as the upper one, and it seemed slightly moving at some moment. Just like there was something unusual in that zone of the window. It couldn't be an object, such a motorbike laid on the wall of the palace, because the shape wouldn't have moved that way, another person there would have been normally standing, without needing hide, and I'd have seen clearly his shadow. And, when we've entered, on the windows I didn't see any flower, which could reproduce a similar effect thanks to the wind."

"So" asked Shion "you asked that woman for..."

"...for a rear exit, that's it. I couldn't be sure that was you, but if I was wrong I could just come back from the same exit, without being noticed by who was here."

Mion giggled: "This fellow could be a valuable opponent..."

"What?"

"OK, Gi-chan this is an official demand! Have you to go work tomorrow afternoon?"

"N-no, next meeting will be on Monday 5th, if there are not any unexpec..."

"GOOD! So tomorrow, after school, you are invited to stay at school and accept my mortal challenge!"

"What the..."

"And you are not supposed to refuse, of course!"

"Do you want to admit them to the club, Mion?"

"Sure, Kei-chan! These two siblings seem absolutely have all the requirements to join us!"

"I agree" exclaimed Rika "so they'll tell us so many nice stories!"

"Well said, Rika-chan! Now, who wants to admit them to the club?"

Every member raised his hand.

"Good, are you happy, Ali-chan, Gi-chan? You aren't? You want to resign? I understand your doubts, but we have to consider it! So, who is against their resign?"

Every member raised his hand, again.

"Good, resign rejected, sorry mates!"

Alice and Giancarlo hadn't said a word, to be honest, but the girl decide to play along her new club mate.

"It's time for an official declaration then: I, Alice Giorgia Serco, accept your formal request, and I'm sure Nii-chan will do so."

Mion laughed, Giancarlo sighed and Keresana went out:

"But before fighting, why don't you come in? I'd like to offer something to you too!"

"Offer? Are you planning to go quickly bankrupt, Keresana-san?"

"You got a coffee for free, why should we pay instead, Gi-chan?"

Shion got a point, and Giancarlo's embarrassed face was the result.

"Come on, it's not a problem for us!" exclaimed Kogorou "I haven't opened this café to enrich myself! Haven't you seen there are only few people inside? Angel Mort's competition is terribly strong in this little city, especially young people prefer to go always there." Shion coughed. "Here come only a little group of habitual customers I like to talk with. I don't need money fortunately, this is only a nice way to fight boredom during this our old age."

Yes, they have not sons, and probably they don't have an heir to give their money to. I understand their decision. This is what Alice thought, while entering again in the café assailed by Rika's questions, who seemed to want to know everything about them.


	5. Trivia and trials

**5 – Trivia and trials**

_Hinamizawa, 2nd September 1983_

"I still wonder why he hasn't come to school today, what a shameful behavior!"

"I wouldn't know what to answer, Mii-chan" told her Alice.

"If Chie-sensei doesn't know anything, it's quite difficult that he's ill."

"Shii-chan, please don't speak so loud. Rena doesn't want to disturb the others."

The four girls were studying together that day, kept busy by the usual marathon of math exercises. But since Keiichi was absent and the Sonozaki twins needed a continuous help that Chie-sensei couldn't give her, Alice had taken his place. She had already studied that specific subject some time before, and she could explain it without any problem. Giancarlo instead was alone, in another zone of the classroom, writing on some papers.

"Keiichi-kun is a marvelous teacher, but Ali-chan is a great one, too." said Rena "She has a so curious way to explain things, she understands how we reason and she finds at once where we make mistakes..."

Alice smiled: "I'm not anything special, after all..."

"This old lady thinks you're great too, and it's very nice to study in a group made of only women, we understand each other easily. Still, I wonder what happened to Kei-chan."

"Oh, Onee, you can't spend your day just thinking about Kei-chan. I understand he's your hobby-horse, but you should change subject, sometimes." Mion turned her head, trying to hide her face.

"Tsk, you talk about him as if he was the only meaning of my life."

"And isn't it true?" Shion leaned her face on Mion's head, daringly smiling.

"Just stop teasing me and go on studying, these exercises won't be solved by magic."

"Mii-chan is right, Keiichi-kun is strong and he can face all his problems, he can."

"I was thinking... Could have he... fallen into another of that girl's traps, Satoko-chan?"

"Hmmm... I wouldn't say so, Ali-chan. Satoko-chan's traps are not thought to keep him motionless for a long time, at least not when he should go to school."

"I agree with Shion... If it was afternoon, time for our activities, she could have tied it and kept him so until evening, but now..."

"Ehmm... tied the whole afternoon... isn't it a bit..."

"...Exaggerated? Nope, when you face Keiichi, you must be prepared to drastic solutions, otherwise he'll overcome you."

"And Satoko-chan's masterpieces are usually built in order to keep him as occupied as she wants, if she needs to do so. I remember a day when she was able to put 187 little water balloons (she counted them minutely, she never forgets such details) in a little closet of the school, each one linked to a single wire; so he provoked him by phone, making him arrive here quite early, and, after having drawn him there, our poor Kei-chan passed half an hour continuously hit by those balloons. When Chie-sensei found him, before starting lesson, he was completely soaked, with his arms full of the wired he run into, he looked as he came from the abysses of the Ocean..."

Satoko, four meters far from them, giggled, probably hearing they were talking about her. Chie-sensei, who was next to her, had not such a sensible hearing, since she didn't say anything to the four chatting students and she didn't understand why Satoko was laughing.

"And that day, when he finally went out that closet, the first thing he made was looking for her and trying to have his revenge, without being unmotivated, and showing all his enthusiasm and energy. But, indeed, it was time to start lesson, and he had to give up."

"Well, considering how much you care about him, Keiichi must be a very interesting person..."

The other girls looked at Alice, slightly worried.

"You said you've already a boyfriend, haven't you?"

The Italian girl quickly realized the sense of that question, and she hurried answering: "Yes... and in fact I wasn't talking about that kind of interest..."

Rena and Mion seemed relieved. "Sure then, he is a very interesting person, you're talking about the Magician of Words."

"Hmmm. A very curious nickname..."

"We'll bring you to the Angel Mort, someday, you'll see what it really means. All the boys there are under his commands." Angel Mort was still Keresana's competitor, but, once considered Kogorou's point of view about the importance of his earnings, it wouldn't have been bad to go there. Making a visit after having been to the Angel Mort would have a completely satisfying compensation, for him and his wife.

"Not bad. He's a sort of Napoleon, then... No, wait, Rena, this function has not any derivative if x is more than 5, there's a square root here."

"Ops, sorry, I'll delete the graph at once... Ah, but since you're here... Why have you left your brother alone over there, why you? He's feeling alone now, for sure."

"Ah... no, I don't think so. He doesn't fear solitude, he's not that kind of boy. Moreover he's doing something completely different from what we're doing, we'd just disturb him."

"He's writing something about old Japanese history? I would gladly change my exercises with his."

"Oh, but his is not a kind of homework, Shii-chan!"

"?"

"He's checking the financial budget of the school, and calculating the future money demand for the next years. The sensei and the principal has given him the previous balances, and all the estimates they've made."

"It doesn't seem difficult..."

"Wait. He has also to calculate a mathematical model to foretell the needs of the school, including salaries (two), stationery, building maintenance, inflation, etc. Making a simplifying example, if you know you have to spend 200.000 Yen each couple of years in order to keep the building standing, and the other factors are constant, the result will be a sort of sinusoide whose apexes are represented by those years, plus some random noise caused by unexpected random events, which must be considered in the model with a tolerance range."

"Now it DOES seem difficult..."

"It's not that much, Mii-chan. Once you know what to do you make some hypothesis and write the right formulas, checking that they give a consistent result, of course. These steps take no more than a couple of hours, after all. If you need some further long and serious calculations you can use computers, nowadays."

Alice continued "Moreover consider that Hinamizawa's Town Council still gives to the school a significant amount of money, and that having this kind of data is very useful to consider how to spend in other projects. Moreover such a model can be expanded to all other offices with similar dimension, so you see his work has quite a relevance here."

The other girls looked at her, amazed.

"This was the deal, after all. Chie-sensei helps us improving our Japanese, and we help her when the other students have to face scientific subjects, or do this genre of little works. Even if formally we do this for free as hobby, and they teach us for free, since we are tourists for authorities we can't work for a Japanese factory, or group."

"You both seem to be very brilliant, Alice, I wonder if you are geniuses, I wonder..."

"Ahah, no, no... Personally I love using computers and programming, which sounds strange since I have not such a logic mind like Nii-chan's one, I guess. We have bought even a Commodore 64 here in Hinamizawa."

"Common Gore? And what it is?"

"Shion, a Cold and More is a computer. She has just said it, are your ears blocked up, Shion?"

"I've understood it myself, stupid Onee! Why do you always have to tease me?"

Both of the twins had to learn better English, not only math, thought Alice, but she wasn't her brother, and she didn't say it aloud.

"I must have seen one of them in a shop in Okinomiya, but I never used it... oh, well, you'll show me."

"And... your brother, he?"

"Who knows, his mind is so... abstract, sometimes hermetic, he likes using unorthodox and never considered ways to solve problems he meets. I think he could do a lot of jobs related to any scientific field, once he decides it's time to work."

In that moment, the door was opened wide. Keiichi entered panting, and he shouted:

"RED ALARM! IT'S A DRAMA! A TRAGEDY! A BETRAIL! BUT IT CAN'T END LIKE THIS!"

"Please calm down, Kei-chan. Please explain what has happened, and why you're so late, it's 10:45."

"You're right, Shion. It was... Kameda-kun."

"And who is he?" asked Alice.

"He's one of his Angel Mort's usual subordinates... But he seems he rebelled against him, if I've well understood what's happened."

"You can say that, Rena! I was going to school, and I've run into him. He had even decided to skip school to meet me, a very serious guilt. And he has dared challenging me in a new baseball match, just this afternoon! I can't imagine what has driven him to this result! A female refusal? His expulsion from the Angel Mort? Both of these? I don't care, my revenge will be inexorable!"

"This afternoon? It seems we are free to accept his daring act, well we can go all together to the baseball field! Do you agree with me, club members?"

"Sure we agree, Mion!" exclaimed Keiichi "this will be a glorious day, since everyone will understand that trying to free himself from my authority is never a good c..."

"Maebara-kun..."

Oops. He made a terrible mistake. Keiichi slowly turned his head, understanding his actual situation and the real danger he hadn't avoided.

"Maebara-kun, don't you know this is a school, this is school time, and I'm still a teacher who has been disturbed by you?"

"Ehm..."

"Do you think I should forgive you?"

"...Maybe?"

Chie-sensei red eyes made him understand she didn't agree with him.

...

Ten minutes later, Maebara Keiichi was outside the classroom, with his pride wounded, his look depressed and his couple of bucklets full of water, one for each hand.

"Why did I deserve this? This is really an off day..."

"And what I should say, then? It's your fault if I am here too!"

On the left side of Keiichi, Mion was holding another bucket.

"It's not a surprise, you've shouted and interrupted their lesson as I've done..."

"It's different! There is a big difference between sizes of our responsibilities! I only reacted to what you said, seconding your wishes and declarations!"

"I've never asked you to do so!"

"We are club mates, of course I was obliged to do that, even if you haven't said anything! Wait, I'm even its president, its ruler, my duty was even bigger then. So, now admit our guilt, and take my bucket."

"And how could I do that? I've my hands busy now, thanks to you!"

"Don't you _really_ know how to do it?" answered Mion, whose evil smile made Keiichi understand what she was thinking to.

"Y-YOU PERVERT! Do you think I do such things with my body?"

"You could use some Viagra, if you aren't sure to hold it properly. Who knows, maybe in the school's first aid box there is what you need."

"It's out of the question!"

"Why? You can't say that without being completely sure, we should try..."

"Don't you! Don't..."

But Mion was happy, in that moment. Spending some moment happily, alone with Kei-chan... maybe breaking the ice in that way could make that a good moment to say she liked him that much... that she loved him. Indeed, maybe it was, they were alone, the others were still blocked in the classroom, Rena included, and kidding him usually made her calmer, and gave her a bit of bravery. She made a deep breath, and she started speaking.

"Kei-chan?"

"What's the matter, now?" Keiichi saw she was serious, and he became serious too.

"After we finish this famous match... What about..."

Mion stopped. She head her heart in her mouth, her legs were shaking. She was sure her face was becoming red as a big pomato, and that Keiichi would have noticed it. But she had already started her speech, she couldn't stop that way, so she swallowed, closed her eyes for a moment, and after some second she tried going on.

"Do you know there is that ice cream shop they've just opened, next to the baseball field we are going to play..."

"To be honest, I didn't know. I haven't gone there since our first match against Kameda and his Okinomiya Titans. It has been... three months ago?"

"Really? It's a nice place, I've seen it once. You're loving it probably, especially after a match under this hot sun..."

"It doesn't seem a bad idea, indeed. We definitely should go there."

Mion smiled. Maybe she had just been able to make her most important step of her whole life. She imagined Keiichi and herself alone in that shop, and she'd have had all the time she need to declare to him her feelings.

"I agree...We should..."

"...we should go all together there, it will be funny to go, it will."

Keiichi and Mion looked at their right, shocked. Another girl holding a full bucket was looking at them.

"RENA! Why are you..."

"Rena can't just leave alone Keiichi-kun and Mi-chan, she can't leave them alone and sad, in this sad moment, because it was greatly sad, was it?" The way she was looking at them made Mion think that there were a lot of hidden meanings under that innocent question, but Keiichi didn't notice this. "So she went out, she took this and filled it."

"Well, what can I say... There will be soon shortage of buckets, in the school." observed Mion, looking elsewhere.

"Maybe, but haven't you seen this?" replied Rena "This bucket is so nice, red colored with a blue handle and a nice rabbit drawn on this side...It's so nice, I'd bring this hoooooooommmmmee!"

"I've never seen this, probably they took it here recently, a present some villager gave. This is still a school, and kids would like this model of bucket." observed Keiichi, smiling "You can't bring it home however, it's probably reserved for younger kids than you, like Rika-chan for example. But you're right about your other idea, we should do something similar, a great party after that match ends. Don't you agree, Mion?"

"Eh? Oh, sure, gwahahaha... And the one who is declared Less Valuable Player by the rest of the club will have to pay the whole bill!"

"I like it, let's do that! And don't think I won't engage, so you're going to be a hundred per cent, or your wallet will quickly get empty! Now, what time is it? I can't wait eating, I must be ready for the match!"

Keiichi and Rena laughed, and after a couple of seconds Mion laughed, too.

...

4:30 PM. The planned match between the Hinamizawa Fighters and the Okinomiya Titans was starting, and the whole club was there. Well, the whole club excluding Shion, who, as Alice was told, had already an engagement with the doctor of the village, Irie, who was then absent even if he was also the Fighters' coach.

"I hope she's OK. She didn't look ill, this morning." asked Giancarlo.

"Tsk, don't worry, my sister is too stubborn and annoying to be easily knocked out by any disease."

Giancarlo then thought for a second that Shion could have been Irie's lover. After all he hadn't still met him, and he couldn't say anything about how the doctor could be. Maybe he could have been someone who had been ejected by a big city hospital because of some scandal, and then he came here and...Nah, sometimes he really exaggerated with those gloomy hypothesis, better to think about the incoming match.

On the field, Kameda was warming-up. His presence was something that nobody expected, neither the Titans, and in fact neither journalists were there, on the contrary of what had happened the previous time.

"Why are you talking about journalists now? Is he so good at baseball?" asked Alice.

"Oh, my, sure he is! He's a phenomenon, maybe the future of Japanese baseball! Can't you see how fast are his pitches?"

"Uhm, no. I'm not expert at all, in Europe we don't play baseball, usually."

A Country without baseball...Keiichi thought she was coming from Mars.

"Well, at least support us. This is a very important match, we can't accept a defeat. The Fighters need three more elements, since they are only six players actually, so we'll choose the most capable members about this noble sport. Mion, Satoko, are you joining me?"

"Yes, sir! We are ready to humiliate him once again!"

"I still wonder why he's been changed so much." Rena was looking at the pitcher's mound, where Kameda was now waiting for the beginning of the match, sneering and looking sure about his skills.

"Why are you saying he's changed? How was he before?"

"Oh, we're talking about a chocaholic, he never stopped wishing for cakes, ice creams... And he made some strange speech about girls who were similar to cakes, and that it was a way to satisfy his libido... I've never completely understand what he meant."

"Oh, my, you're talking about someone with serious problems, in my opinion! At least he's challenging Kei-chan now, he seems a bit more adult. Sure, laughing that way is not a sign of particular wisdom, but it's better than spending his day eating candies..."

"Ok, please stop Ali-chan, you'll be allowed to annoy him once this farce will have finished. Now, it's our turn to attack, so let's go!"

Talking about attack sounded out of question, since, after six innings, the result was still 0-0. Because of a short break, the seventh one was going to begin in a dozen of minutes, it was again the Fighters' turn to attack, and Kameda was already waiting on the mount, smiling.

"I still don't understand why he's acting so! And this old lady is getting tired, she could have some rest if these idlers would at least know the basic rules about this game!"

"We've never used a bat before, Mi-chan... You can't ask us to replace you, if you want seriously to win..."

"Well, at least you could look more interested in this match!"

"But I _am _interested! It's my club mates' match, after all!"

"Do you think so? So why I've heard so few incitements until now?"

"Because your ears are glitched, probably! That helmet makes you completely deaf, I guess!"

"Mi-chan, Ali-chan, please stop now..." Rena was not worried about the girls apparent quarrel. She knew it was Mion's way to build an informal relationship with the others, she just made the same thing with Keiichi, some month before. She stopped them for another reason. "I think to know why Kameda-kun is so strange, today..."

"So?"

"Well, I looked at the road nearby and...there is a car, there is. That blue car with dark glasses. It's been there since before the match. And inside it, it's not easy to see them, but I saw...a man with binoculars, and a woman on the back seats. A young woman, she seems."

"And who they should be?"

"Rena doesn't know, but...Kameda-kun often looks at that direction, so..."

"It's very curious, very strange. I don't understand why isn't she here to support him directly, instead of staying there."

"Maybe she's his girlfriend, she must be a very shy girl."

"Or maybe she's his wife."

"But Kameda-kun is too young!"

"Maybe a secret wedding..."

"You're joking! Kameda-kun isn't even 20!"

Being 20... Alice thought that luckily she was Italian, so she had already reached her age of majority, and as regular Italian citizen she was allowed to fly to Japan just with her brother, be owner of a house in Hinamizawa thanks to Keresana's help, be able to drive (even if Flavia regularly kidnapped their car) and so on. If she was Japanese she still would have to wait for a couple of years.

After a quick discussion, however, Keiichi made a proposal: "Well, we definitely should have a look at them, we must know something more about this story. Who wants to go there and make some question? Satoko, Mion and me can't, we're still playing a match..."

"I don't think to be suitable for it too." said Giancarlo. "Probably the man with binoculars is just the car's driver, the other woman should be the key of this mystery. And I suppose she'd talk more gladly with another girl...or even better a little kid."

"Do you want me to go there, Gii?"

"Why not?" Alice seconded her brother "If you want, take with you Rena or me, too. You just have to go there and ask _Who are you? Why are you here, have you some problem?_. Ah, of course don't forget adding some very nice _Nippaaa_ to look funnier and cuter, like this" He united his hands, closed her eyes, altered his voice, and while amusingly smiling he exclaimed "Nippa~!"

"Why are you annoying me, now? Don't kid me!" she exclaimed, touchy. She blew her cheeks, apparently angry, but hers was not a good idea.

"Hauuuu, when Rika's face is so cute I can't do anything but bringing her HOOOOOOOMMMMEEE!" Rika made a couple of steps backwards, terribly worried, but the others stopped Rena on time.

"Maybe you can do it later, Rena, but now it's not time" answered Satoko, before talking to Rika "now go there at once, you can see how we are getting so curious." After having said this, she went to the batter's box, since it was her turn. Kameda looked at her, quiet, then he started preparing another pitch. He was going to release the ball, when he saw Rika and Rena approaching the blue car, and he became much less quiet. "What are yo..." The fright made him release the ball slightly before than he wanted, and with it he hit directly the poor Satoko's face, since she wasn't able to avoid that terrific fastball. She fell insensible, but everyone's fear quickly disappeared since it was clear she was just unconscious and that she was probably seeing stars.

"Hey, where are the referees? This can't be just a walk, he hit her on purpose! He must be ejected!"

"N-no, I..."

"You can't deny it, Kameda!" shouted Kei-chan "Have you already forgotten what I taught you months ago!"

"K, I've just..."

"You just what? One day in the past you promised me your final goal was going to be protecting girls you appreciated so much, and now you are a danger for their safety? How can you do this! You saw all the waitress at the Angel Mort, you watched a lot of images on tons of magazines, you...you...I don't know what you've done, I can't know, I don't want to know! What I can say about your behavior is that you are a betrayer, a moron, a person who doesn't even remember his promises, and he doesn't consider them at all! How can I consider you a friend of mine, or even a faithful vassal, now?"

"No, please, don't..."

"Shut up, I haven't finish yet! If you still have some bit of sense of honour, just admit your fault, and then go away from this place! If you do so maybe I'll forgive you for what you've done now, for what you've done this morning, and so your soul will no suffer the next time your feet will trample on a baseball field!"

This was not a very loyal way to win that match, finding an excuse to send off their best player, but maybe it was the only one, scoring even a point would have been impossible otherwise.

"But, but I can't do that! Please have mercy on this unlucky boy!"

"Ah, and why should I do that! Please answer me, why?"

"Because I ask you to do so."

Keiichi looked behind him. The famous woman they were talking about went out of the car, and she was there in front of him now. Kameda looked at her, and crying he asked:

"Mother, please don't interfere, it's a matter I can face myself..."

"M-M-mother?"

She looked much younger than what she was really, she could have been mistaken for an idol, or a famous model. Plastic surgery and heavy make up can make authentic miracles, nowadays.

"Wait" exclaimed Rena "so he did so, he acted so, he behaved so, just to..."

"...to make her mother happy and proud of him? That's all?"

"Mommy is always Mommy!" shouted Kameda, running away and entering into the car. Her mother followed him, angrily looking at Keiichi.

While the car left, Satoko revived.

"Aaaaa...what has...?"

"Happy to see you again on this Earth, Satoko! Are you OK?"

"...More or less..."

"Good, but sit on the bench now, we can't risk your safety. So...Gi-chan?"

"Uhm?"

"Go on the field, you're replacing her. You're being our pinch runner."

"I think to have understood how this game works now, but-"

"BUT WHAT?" Mion's voice tone couldn't accept refusals, and her intimidating fist was convincing enough. Giancarlo sighed, after all he only had to run, and he started his little baseball career.


	6. Satoshi's Shadow

**6 – Satoshi's shadow**

_Hinamizawa, 5th September 1983_

"Yes, I've understood. Thank you very much." Mion hung up, while Rika, who was at the Manor with her, asked her how the meeting worked.

"Those twins... Seemed to know what to do, there. Even Uncle Yoshiro has been so surprised." After being asked by Rika, she had told him to go the meeting the Sercos had to take part in, pretending to be a potential new customer. Just to have more info about them, and to see how they behave in those situations. "They went there with that friend of them, Keresana-san, not to look simply a couple of foreign kids... But once they started, they've gained the others' respect. Ali-chan was the one speaking most, talking pleasantly, creating a good environment and explaining most of the subject, but when there was a question, her brother answered quickly, and very precisely. I suppose their father taught them well." Rika smiled.

"So... has it ended well?"

"_Very_ well, according to him. Their customers seem to be so enthusiastic, they've told things like _I can't think you're still so young_, or _We couldn't expect less from Serco-san's sons _and so on. Their father seems to be quite respected, and they knew how to take advantage of it."

"I'd say Ali-chan is just like Keiichi-kun, when they speak they take the others' attention..."

"They could have some analogy, yes. But Kei-chan is usually noisier, I think. And he has all those characteristics which are typical of males. Oh, well, our Magician of Words might have met a proud opponent, Gwahahah!"

"We should make some verbal contest, Mii!"

"You really are right, it's a very good idea! We should dress them just like they were senators, then we can ask them to speak, and to convince us to punish only the other one. Hear what they are able to say would be incredibly amazing!"

"Who do you think would win the match?"

"Hmmm... I'd say Kei-chan, probably. Remember that he knows us more deeply."

"I see... What about Gi-chan, instead? Who is he similar to?"

"I wouldn't know, he's quite a silent guy... maybe Rena-chan? No, the way he took care of her sister and brought her bento reminds me of... Satoshi-kun."

_Satoshi-kun... I wonder how he's now,_ she thought, _I hope for Shion he is recovering soon_. Irie was still working for a cure, but Satoshi's return didn't seem near.

"Well, it doesn't matter." she laughed. "They are not clones, they have their unique elements who can make them precious additions for our club! But... can you explain me why you're so interested in them now, Rika-chan?"

"Oh...nothing. I just want to know everything, everything, everything... they're so strange, Mii!"

"Strange and strangers are related words, indeed... but aren't you exaggerating now?"

"No... I just want to be sure about them."

Mion didn't understand the meaning of that answer.

...

"Long sleeves? But aren't you hot, Gii?"

The following morning, at school, was maybe the hottest one of the whole summer, even if September had already started. Giancarlo, however, seemed not to suffer it. He was wearing a light blue shirt, which was nothing special, but its sleeves and its buttons, well closed despite the high temperature, were something which drew Rika's attention.

"I like to wear comfortable clothes, once they are suitable to come to school. I just feel fine so."

"But they can't be comfortable, with this weather..."

"Well, for someone they are. Hotness and coldness depends a lot on who feels them. Don't you agree?"

"Uhmm... It's strange. I hope you won't sweat."

"Oh, don't worry, Nii-chan is quite tough, when we talk about weather changes, he won't suffer because of this, unless we put him into an oven, well, in that case it would be different..." While saying it, Alice was looking at the other side of the corridor. Over there, a new episode of the Endless War had just started, and no one could say who would have been the winner, this time. Over there, Satoko was holding a remote control, and, from time to time, she was pushing some button on it, apparently by chance. But her facial expression could make everyone have no doubts about her real will, and about the addressee of that will. Not far from her, in fact, Keiichi was avoiding a myriad of gum bullets coming from the walls, helping himself with a bat. Something she must have prepared very early in the morning, while her opponent was still sleeping... But those bullets were quite big, slightly smaller than a tennis ball, and so Keiichi could see them even if they flew at a very high speed. This really seemed a mistake by the Trap Master.

"Satoko, when you are out of bombs, you'll have to be prepared!"

"Ho ho ho ho, do you think you'll be still able to move, when it happens?"

"I knew it, you're going to cause me some serious damage, with these!"

"How mean by you, Keiichi-san. I have exactly calculated _everything_, including where the bullets aim at, and I'm choosing the proper moment to press these triggers. You won't be hit in vital zones, so you won't have any proof about my real will... But if you start moving that way, I could make some calculation mistake, and in that case I will say it has been a tragic fatality."

While saying it, she pressed two new buttons, but the fired bullets were deflected by Keiichi's bat. He noticed that they didn't seem that dangerous, since, after all, they were just made of soft gum, so they couldn't hurt him that much even if they hit him. Trustful, he gained some self-control, and he decided to openly face his opponent.

"And do you really want me to surrender, then? How if it would be possible. I'd rather to eat my shoes!"

"Oh, you're going to do it, I can secure it. Are you ready for this?"

"Let's see!"

Satoko hit three more buttons, and three more bullets were dodged. Keiichi was sure to win, he knew everything about her, and her tricks couldn't scare him anymore. He is a hero, the greatest one, the one who will be able to save the world from the darkness. This is what he thought, while smiling like the protagonist of a picture story. But the evil girl then turned her control, and hit a big red button hidden in the back of it.

"What are you..." Keiichi couldn't finish the sentence. A trap door in the ceiling suddenly opened, and a giant wooden statue fell on Keiichi's head. Satoko won once again.

"Y-y-you..." Keiichi was stuck under the statue, unable to move "You already knew how it was going to end... those gum bullets were just a diversion, y..."

"As I've told you 30 seconds ago, _I have calculated everything_. You should listen to me more carefully, when I talk to you."

"At least, can I know where have you taken this statue from?"

"Oh, that's just the last of Rena-san's discoveries. I've borrowed it just for today, just for this test, just for you. Aren't you happy to see how I take care of you?"

"Ahuuuuu! After this ends, I will bring it hoooommeee! And I'll bring Keiichi-kun hooooommmmeeeee! And I will bring everything else hoooooommmmeee!"

"Rena, you betrayer, and you, evil Trap Master, I'd prefer you let me live peacefully, sometimes! At least, have you washed this thing before using it? It's dirty, there is even some loam here!"

"I couldn't... it's a wooden statue, if I used too much water it would have bloated, and Rena-san would have not been happy about it. And the final result would have not changed at all, don't you agree?"

"Could you show me a bit of respect at least once in your life? You... "

And they kept on arguing so. In the meanwhile, Alice and Giancarlo were looking at the scene shocked.

"Is it... normal?" asked the girl "I hope he's OK."

"Oh, don't worry, Kei-chan's head is tougher than marble!" answered Shion "He's quite used to it, he will be fine in 10 or less minutes."

"I wonder where those balls came out from. I hope Satoko-chan hasn't holed the whole wall, this is a public school..." Alice approached, to have a deeper look. "Uhm... Oh, I see... a fake wall."

"Ho ho ho ho! You're right. This is just a group of wooden planks I've painted accurately, just to make sure this unlucky clumsy opponent couldn't notice the difference. And behind it, an incredibly high amount of mousetraps, working as catapults, which are controlled by this nice, colored and fashionable device!"

"Very good... have you even thought about a time control, or an automatic one?"

"Hmmm... yes, but I didn't see any benefit. An automatic working usually runs into more failures. If there had been a problem, before..."

"Gwa-ha-ha-ha, just because Satoko is a twisted genius, but she's still so young... For example, combine both of the kinds of controls... and when you reach the end of the battle, throw the remote control while saying _I surrender, _so while Kei-chan is approaching... a devastating blast against him!"

"Oh-ho, Mion-san... I see now."

"Hey, you two, stop advising her!" If the Trap Master had started gaining so many allies Keiichi would have been forced to seek safety in Greenland. Unfortunately, nobody cared about what he said, so he closed his eyes, dejected.

"Oh, finding new ways to tease Kei-chan is always such a lovely subject... but now come here with your Nee-Nee, Satoko!". The girl Shion was talking to was not very happy to hear this, since she run away somewhat, while the green-haired girl started looking for her. Rika, who was still there, took the bat Keiichi used until that moment.

"This is like a sword for him." she said "You've seen how much he's good with it, he could fought 100 enemies. But unfortunately Satoko is just like 1000 enemies all together, too many for him."

"I see... well, for me one enemy would have been enough, I am not good at all with that." Giancarlo, looking at the bat, thought about the baseball match "In the 9th inning I couldn't even try a swing, I had told you it was the first time for me."

"Because you've lived on another planet until now! Man, at least try to spin that bat, next time... How could you not to know anything about baseball?" Giancarlo didn't answer, but Alice sounded bothered by Mion's comment.

"Tsk, another planet, the green-like-a-Martian-haired girl has just spoken. We're sorry for that, but we're not the only ones with this genre of lacks. For example, does _this old lady_ know anything about football, _Mi-chan_?"

"That absurd activity where two groups of players run behind a ball, kicking it as they were barbarians? Oh, I must have read something somewhere... oh, now I remember, it was _Captain Tsubasa_'s first volume. I am quite interested in exotic usage, on the contrary of someone else I've met last week."

"Ahhh, and do you know who won the last World Cup, in Spain?"

"Oh, I really don't know."

"_WE _did! I'm sure you haven't even seen Marco Tardelli's run, after scoring the second goal in the final. The most thrilling moment of our national team's history, we had won nearly nothing for 50 years, we defeated Brazil and all the strongest opponents imaginable, and this girl doesn't know it?"

"Ooooh, now you know how I felt myself some day ago, when two of my friends didn't know how to play our holy sport, _Ali-chan_?"

No one divided them, it was obvious they were quarreling by joke, they hardly were able to avoid laughing. Probably they took a liking to each other since their first meeting. Rika, then, calmly picked up Keiichi's bat, who was still on the floor.

"Gii, could you put it in Keiichi-kun's cabinet? It's too heavy for me."

Giancarlo took it, looked at its knob, turned his glance towards Rika. Then he put the bat away, and he went back to her, saying nothing. Rika eyed him.

"Haven't you anything to ask?"

"I wouldn't even need it, once you say so. You'll tell us anyway, am I wrong?"

"What are you talking about now?" asked Shion, who in the meanwhile had grabbed Satoko in the classroom.

"The name on the bat..." explained Rika. The other girls understood.

"We hadn't told you about Houjou Satoshi, and about Furude Hanyuu, too. Let's do it right now." She summarized Satoshi's story in a few minutes, his family, his uncles, his attempts to protect her sister Satoko and the fact he _went away_ more than a year ago.

"But I am sure, we are sure... he's coming back soon. We have... we were given a lot of positive hints about his return." said Shion, who had strangely become quite melancholy. _Maybe he was her girlfriend_, thought Alice, _but if this is the case I don't understand whether she said it because it's the truth, or rather because she wants it to be so, just to give herself some hope_. She preferred to change subject, then she asked: "But why must his bat be in Kei-chan's cabinet, now?"

Shion seemed to recover from her melancholy: "Because he's like a brother for her, even if she won't admit it!"

"It's not true!" exclaimed Satoko, blushing. She was still holding her control, and she pushed the last button on it, causing the shot of another gum bullet which finished in Keiichi's mouth, plugging it as an apple could do it with a roasted pig. He whimpered comically, after having suffered that last strike, then he definitely fainted.

Everyone laughed at him, then, Rika finished her speech by talking about her relative Hanyuu, who stayed in Hinamizawa for a short visit during the Watanagashi, and then she left away. "Just some day before you arrived here."

"A real pity!" exclaimed Alice. Rika smiled, but she could add nothing more for now, Chie-sensei was calling for them. They threw a bucket full of hot water to Keiichi (not a cold one, as explained Satoko, once considered the hot weather it could have been a relief for him), and they went to the classroom. While entering, Alice heard Rika saying:

"I don't want you to misunderstand something... If you want to know _anything_, just ask us."

...

"Very good, club members! Today you can choose between even two, and I repeat two, games. One is Dodgeball, a 4vs4 match outside, the other is the old good Baba-nuki. OK, what do you choose?"

"Do you know what Baba-nuki is, Nii-chan?"

"It's just the Old Maid card game, Alice."

"We should go for it, then."

"I agree. Moreover, it's too hot today, and playing outside is not a good idea."

"You've decided so quickly. Why are you choosing so quickly, why?"

It took a couple of seconds for them to answer.

"Well... you know. Nii-chan is a bookworm, as I've told you. We'll have more chances if we don't play a physical kind of game."

"You already know that our club the loser suffer horrible punishments, and you don't want to take advantage of your brother's weaknesses? Yours is a mortal sin, you could regret to have chosen so." Keiichi acted confident and trustful, as the poor figure of the morning had never happened. But, to be honest, he was also a little scared: he didn't want to play Old Maid, since he had lost so many times in the past, and that game considered always the same penalty... That maid dress had nearly become his second skin. But after some second, he changed his mind. After all, they were still newbies, they didn't know what playing in this club really meant... especially, they didn't know what playing card games really meant... Hee-hee-hee...

"Ok, you've voluntarily decided so, you can't say we've forced you. Let's deal at once!" He put on the desk their old deck, and he started shuffling it.

"But... wait... what these marks on the cards are? In this way... you've been playing with this for some time, don't tell us… that… you can see exactly where each card will be..."

Keiichi laughed scornfully, and then he stood up and shouted: "That's it! You're too late now! Let's make the hell's doors open!"

Ten matches later, Keiichi looked at the score on the blackboard, dejected. Giancarlo lost the first round, Alice the second one, but the other eight ones had seen him losing systematically. He couldn't afford it:

"This can't be possible? How you were able to recognize all the cards only after a couple of matches? It's not fair, not fair at all!"

"Are you saying we are cardsharpers, Kei-chan?"

"No... but how can you...?"

"Do you want to explain it, Nii-chan? You've got the idea, after all."

"What?"

(Sigh) "Just consider the number of scratches here. We couldn't remember their position after so few matches, but we could consider their number. For example, most of card games gives high value to Aces, so I imagine you look for them more often, and they are more spoiled, then. The three of clubs, instead, is smooth, nearly like a new card, can you see here?"

"I've noticed it when Nii-chan was looking for the most scratched cards, during the second round" explained Alice "He was looking for an Ace, indeed. You see, in such situations he's a so valuable helper, I'm used to see how he acts during these intellectual issues, before it's my turn." His brother shook his head while smiling, as if he was saying she had to do that alone.

"But... but... you couldn't recognize all the cards this way! Kings and Queens are scratched in the same way, for example!"

"That's why Nee-chan and I have started holding our cards in a particular way."

"What?"

"Have I to explain to you everything? We held cards with an even value slightly inclined towards the left side, and the cards with an odd one were inclined to the right. It's not something that hard to do, if you have no more than five or six cards. Once you decide that Jacks are equal to 11, Queens to 12 and Kings to 13, all these hints combined make you quite sure to choose the proper cards, of course while starting learning to associate the various scratches to each card."

"So... both of you always knew each other's cards! It's not fair, you're just cheaters!"

"It's not true, Kei-chan" Alice answered "It's something we decided at the moment, while playing and without saying it aloud. A tacit agreement, if you prefer to call it so. And if you don't trust us remember that we didn't even know you were going to use such a spoiled deck. As you've told us before, this is a game where there is only one loser, and not only one winner, so it's reasonable to use such devices. Moreover, if you really want to know, all your opponents have used the same technique in the last matches."

Keiichi was shocked. He turned towards Rena.

"I'm sorry Keiichi-kun, but after four or five rounds I've understood why they held their cards in that way, I thought it was a good idea to use their system, so... aren't you angry with me, are you?"

"Ara ara, how could you miss this obvious trick? I've noticed it more or less when Rena did, and Rika too."

"Nippa~!" In that moment, Rika remembered her dialogue of the previous day with Mion.

"_No, she was wrong, they are so different from Satoshi-kun, for example he was a real clumsy boy, when he played card games with us. Maybe I should relax, sometimes..."_

"What are you saying, Rika?"

Damn, was she speaking aloud? "Oh, no, no, it's nothing, Satoko! Nippa~!"

"Hmmm... OK, however, it's obvious that only a stupid villain like you could focus on his cards without seeing what was happening around him..."

"Satoko, stop calling me a villain!"

"Ha ha ha, well, Satoko is not that wrong... in the final matches we did so, too!" exclaimed Mion, laughing and looking at her sister "We can find without any possible doubt every card from this deck by only looking at the scratches, but misunderstanding risks always exist, so this was a nice way to be even more sure... So, _Kei-chan_..."

The sinister tone she spoke the last word with made Keiichi understand that that maid dress was still there, and that he'd have run into it another time, and only Oyashiro-sama knows how many other ones in the future.

...

"Phew, this definitely has not been a shortcut!"

It was quite late, sun had already set, but a couple of little girls was still walking on the old steep path. Rika and Satoko's way from home to school was usually not so long, but during that afternoon a landslide had blocked it, and they had to make a detour. Anyway it was not anything serious, some of the inhabitants were already removing all the rubble, and by tomorrow morning the usual road would have been available again.

"I don't remember there had ever been a landslide in Hinamizawa. It sounds new to me."

"It happens rarely here, you're right. We're lucky because there are a lot of trees here, and mountains are not so high in this zone, so the soil usually doesn't move. Chie-sensei explained it to us some month ago, do you remember?"

"Well... yes, you're right. You know, going on the mountains and creating my masterpieces there is not that sure, if there is really this kind of risk. I should make some experiment to check their safety level... do you think that villain will be able to avoid a ton of rocks and soil?"

"Oh, Satoko, I can't answer you, you should try!"

"Ho ho ho ho, it's not a bad idea! And I'm going to sell the results of this experiment to the town council, they will be interested in them, they surely want to make the village sure! I'm going to earn a marvelously big amount of money thanks to Keiichi-san, and we're going to eat beef tenderloin for the next 50 years!"

Rika laughed, then she didn't say anything else until they reached home. She was discussing _with someone else_ if that landslide could have been a bad presage.


	7. TIP: Forgotten worlds I

**Author's note: in Higurashi's visual novel, the TIPS are a sort of little side stories, which aren't necessary to the main plot but add some interesting detail. I am planning to add some TIP too, just like this one. Please note that, as the title of the TIP suggests, in this case I write about a past world, and not about the one of the main plot (you'll easily understand this when you read it). Ah, and in the next chapter you'll see the beginning of the real main plot...**

**...**

******TIP #1 – Forgotten Worlds I**  


_Nii-Nii is not at home, where is Nii-Nii?_

He's not been here for a year. I miss him, where is he? Maybe it's my fault. I have to be a good girl. Uncle Teppei is here now, he must be the one who will test my bravery. Our Aunt was killed a year ago, and Satoshi disappeared. I've not seen her corpse, Rika told me what had happened, and I trust her. I haven't seen neither my parents' ones. I don't care that much, they were evil. They wanted to do something bad against me, I'm sure, I'm sure about it. If they were good people they wouldn't have been hated by the whole village, and they would be still alive. So my Aunt was a bad person, too, that's why she died. But why Satoshi is not here anymore? Maybe he was not good enough, and he failed his test. But if I pass it maybe he will come back, and we will happy again. I have to save this house until Satoshi comes home, I have to be brave, I have to behave as a good girl.

...

_Nii-Nii is not at home, where is Nii-Nii?_

Teppei has been here for a month now. Why hasn't Satoshi come back yet? Haven't I still passed this hard test? Haven't I been good enough? I've cooked for him, I've washed his clothes, I've made everything he ordered me to do, so why my trial has not finished yet? The others told me to ask for help, but why should I? Nii-Nii had never done that, if I am convinced by my friends I'm going to fail this test. If this interference was allowed, he would have asked for it, last year. No... now I understand. Satoshi didn't ask for help, but on the contrary with them he had not been kind... he had not been kind at all. He hadn't been polite because he knew that being polite was not necessary, even, he knew it was totally harmful. He has been the one who killed Auntie. Now I understand, he acted so evilly to win his challenge and then Oyashiro-sama made him disappear as prize, and not as penalty. He killed our Aunt, and he went away from this horrid village, from this cruel community. So if I kill Teppei, will I go away too? And where? Maybe will I go where he went too? Maybe I'm going to reach him. Surely I'm reaching him. Surely, it's the only way to reach him. I was wrong, I have not to be a good girl.

...

_Nii-Nii is not at home, where is Nii-Nii?_

I wonder if Teppei's life has been a satisfactory sacrifice. His motorbike is quite an old model, and it was easy to sabotage. This morning he had to went to Okinomiya, but he had to go through the woods. I made sure that the engine exploded after a dozen of minutes, and the accident must have killed him. I'm sure, he can't have survived it. Where could be his corpse, by now? I don't know, but who cares. There's a cliff next to the road, and the explosion must have pushed him down. And even if it didn't happen and they found him, it has no importance. They will never understand it has been a sabotage, that motorbike is old, they're thinking just about a mortal failure. What if there was some witness? Well... the more, the better. They will confirm I wasn't there, and they will talk about the explosion. Anyways, I don't need any witness either, I've been here the whole day, and I've asked for someone from the Child Consultation Center to come here, just to have an alibi. I've opened the door when they rang the bell and I've told them it's all okay, and I'm not lying. Teppei is dead, and I'll reach Nii-Nii.

...

_Nii-Nii is not at home, where is Nii-Nii?_

Why am I still here? Why Satoshi is not here, at least? I don't understand. The others seem relieved that Teppei is not here anymore, but they think I'm not fine yet. Of course I am not fine, you idiots! Are you believing I could be ever fine, while Satoshi is not here? How can I be happy? Maybe... maybe that's because I've just copied what my brother did, or maybe that's because Teppei was not enough as sacrifice. I knew it. Nii-Nii showed me the path to follow, but in order to get his same prize I have to do more than him. Yes, I can't be rewarded in the same way if I don't do something more, something special. This trial would have been too easy, I have to go over what he committed. So what should I do? Watanagashi Festival will occur in some day, that would be a good period to act... No, maybe an ever better moment is right now, before the festival. They are all thinking only about it, even the ones claiming to be my friends. I know it. They pretend to be worried about me, but they just want to celebrate, they just want to be happy. I understand them, I want to be happy too, but I can't trust them. I know what to do now, Nii-Nii showed me the solution, now I'll bring it to the extreme consequences.

...

_Nii-Nii is not at home, where is Nii-Nii?_

I've finished, finally, just in time. Watanagashi would have been tomorrow, but I don't think there will be someone in Hinamizawa who wants to celebrate now. The Three Families had condemned my parents, they had condemned Satoshi, they had condemned me. Now I've condemned them.

Kimiyoshi was the first, and probably the hardest to hit, he just pretended to forget everything about me. You fool, did you really hope it was possible? It was not difficult to put some poison in the stock of sake they brought him some day ago. It was enough to locate the van carrying it and to make it stop with a bunch of nails, and while they were trying to change their tires I had made what I had to. Of course, in this way you can't choose the one to kill, and I've heard that a lot of that family members have died because of it, but personally I only cared that the chief of the family could not survived.

About the Sonozakis, killing Oryou would have been hard too, but why should I kill someone who was already going to die in a few years? Getting rid of her heiress would have been much more satisfying. Poor Mion, so easy to deceive and to bring to my home. A little excuse, a stab though her heart while she was looking elsewhere, and that girl was no more.

Rika was even easier. She went directly to me, after being informed about the fate undergone by the chiefs of the other families, and she said something strange about this condemned world, I couldn't really understand that weird talk. But in the end she had also added "If you're going to kill me, here I am, do it right now." Thank you very much, Miss Furude. I don't care about her corpse, and about Mion's one, too. I'm keeping them somewhere in my house. After all, even if they find them here, they won't get me. Nii-Nii is going to take me away from here, now, towards a happy world. It's over now. I've done what I needed, and I don't mind if they are suspecting about me, Nii-Nii will save me. Soon I am about to be happy, Satoshi will come to me, I will go with Satoshi.

...

_Nii-Nii is not at home, where is Nii-Nii?_

I really don't understand. Why I am still far from him? Why am I running? Why am I on this bridge? And why this stupid boy is running behind me... I stop. Stupid Keiichi-san, you're just like Nii-Nii, aren't you? And so why don't you understand? Why are you saying we're still friends? Please stop, don't dare saying that. Do you still want to live with Satoshi and me? Why? You're not allowed to come with us. To join us, you should pass your test, you should kill so many people, as I did. You should destroy the whole Hinamizawa. So you should kill me, and Nii-Nii.

Sorry.

You're pretending to be like Nii-Nii, but you are not Nii-Nii. I can't let you do so, I must protect Satoshi.

...

_Nii-Nii is not at home, where is Nii-Nii?_

I can see Keiichi-san's body on those rocks. He can't have survived, this bridge is so high. And even now I am still alone. Now I understand, in order to make him coming back, I have to give him the most precious thing I still have. Probably I had not to kill the others, I had to kill myself. I'm next to the edge of the bridge, I look down, I close my eyes, I feel my body going slowly forward, towards the precipice.

...

_Nii-Nii is not at home, where is Nii-Nii?_

I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I understand I've done something terrible, I've realized it only now. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry.

...

_Nii-Nii is not at home, where is Nii-Nii?_


	8. A glance towards the Abyss

**8 - A glance towards the Abyss**

_Hinamizawa, 26th September 1983_

Satoko woke up suddenly. What...what a nightmare. A very realistic one, furthermore. As if she could do such horrible things to her friends. It was still very early, Rika was still sleeping. It was not rational, she knew it, but Satoko was happy to see her little friend still alive. However she decided to have a walk around, just to completely calm down herself.

When she came back, she found Rika awake, waiting for her. Satoko didn't know whether telling her what she had dreamed, or not. After all it was something never happened, being worried about it was stupid, anyway... She didn't say anything during breakfast, and once she had finished she stood up at once, to go and check the contents of his schoolbag, to be sure she had forgotten nothing, when Rika asked her for a service:

"Tonight... could you help me to write a novel?"

"A novel? I didn't know you liked it..."

"Yes... but I'm not good at imaging nice stories as you do. I know you make so wonderful traps, so I'm sure you can imagine nice plots, and interesting characters... maybe you do such strange dreams and you don't even have to imagine the story..."

"Sure! But... wait! I've already met this kind of excuse... When you pretended to be interested in mangas... There is nobody who wants to kill you again like Takano-san, am I right?"

"Ooh, Satoko, if I was worried I'd have already asked Keiichi-kun to help me, our strength wouldn't be enough, against that kind of enemy. Nippa~!"

"Hey, it's not kind to say that! What could that villain do that I can't?" she answered. But that dialogue made her calmer._ Yes, I am quite creative, after all. How could I be so stupid to be scared by my imagination..._

Rika looked at her relieved friend, smiling. She was pretty sure about what had happened to her that night, she didn't need to tell her. _You're still too young, Satoko... When you have grown, you'll understand._

...

"You really are easily entertained..."

"Ah, Gi-chan, you should be more sporting..." He turned and he told her: "Mion, you can't say about being sporting after having sabotaged my water gun! It's not... AND DON'T LAUGH!"

"With those drawings on your face? Impossible!" As penalty for having lost in the daily activity, they had painted his face to make him look a cat. Alice, once seen her brother, was so amused that she asked to be painted as a fox, even if she hadn't to.

"Well, I'm quite relieved that you took my place, today" Keiichi leaned his hand on Giancarlo's shoulder. "Avoiding a loss is never a bad result, here. But don't think tomorrow's epilogue will be different, I'm not the fool you knew anymore, I've learned everything I could learn, and I'm ready to put it into practice! This is the beginning of a shining future, where I'll pass all my quests, and I will decide all the penalties for all of you! Nobody will stop me!"

"Tsk. It would have been enough that they sabotaged your gun instead of mine, and you wouldn't speak that way. Next time I should personally choose your penalty."

"Eeek! Hey, don't say it!"

"Gi-chan seems so bothered because he has lost! Since tomorrow his wish of revenge will be strong, Rena will be ready for it! But... by the way, Mii-chan, where are we going all together?"

"We're not all together, Rena, Rika-chan and Satoko-chan have already gone home..."

"And this seems even strange to me." exclaimed Alice "In these days she was always glued to Nii-chan and me, and she was going on asking tons of questions, _How are your parents, how many friends did you have at home, have you got any reccurrent dream..._ She's a sweetie girl, but in these days she was getting pretty scary..."

"He he" said Keiichi "I agree about the fact she looks quite strange, sometimes, but in the end she's just curious, she must find you interesting."

"Keiichi-kun is right, he is. But usually we don't walk on this path, so there must be a reason. If Rena is not wrong this road brings to Irie Clinic."

"Good intuition, Rena! Indeed, we have to go there and pick Shion up, it's quite late and she can't stay there all the day. And then help the doctor to move some archives... I haven't clearly understand if it's a quick issue, but in these cases the more we are, the better."

Keiichi was worried _Why have I the presage only Giancarlo and I will work, while the girls drink peacefully some tea? _Then he looked at the time: "It's already 6:30 PM... Are you sure the Clinic is still opened?"

"They're going to close it just in half an hour, don't worry. At this hour the Clinic is always empty, so we will be free to move the archives without disturbing any patient. OK, we are nearly arrived, here it is."

They entered into the building, calling Irie-sensei. Nobody answered initially. After a couple of minutes, a young woman came towards them, slowly walking.

"Takano-san, do you know where the sensei is?"

"I... don't know. He went downstairs with... Shion-chan an hour ago... I suppose they are still there, but I am not sure."

Alice observed the young woman, who had sat on a chair without adding anything else. They had already met some day before, and even during that first time the melancholy she appeared with was something that had really impressed her. She was explained that Takano, previously a nurse working there, was a patient of the clinic now, since she had a mental breakdown a couple of months ago, and she still had to rest in that calm village to recover. _It sometimes happens in Japan, especially in big cities their lifestyle is quite stressful, _Alice thought_. Anyway if she has suffered that breakdown in Hinamizawa, it would be better for Takano to move elsewhere, far from her source of stress, maybe... Oh, probably there she's still here for some good reason, Irie is certainly not an irresponsible._

"I'm wondering what are they doing there..." Rena's question interrupted her thoughts.

"I don't know, they knew we were coming. Wait a minute, I'll go to call them." Mion went behind the counter, and she opened a little gate which allowed her to reach a little metal door with a little red sign "DO NOT ENTER – STAFF ONLY". She turned the handle.

"The door is not locked... so they are really still downstairs. OK, please wait for me."

She went in, leaving the door opened. In the meanwhile, Keiichi started walking around the clinic. The building was empty, as he was told, and so he was feeling free to wander along the hallways, and to explore all its rooms, not fearing to disturb other people. He was looking for something.

"Hmmm... where should the archives be? I'd like to see them, I fear that Mion is planning to force us to work hard."

"Rena doesn't know, but she can help you to look for them, Keiichi-kun."

"Oh, thank you. Let's go at once, then."

The clinic was not a giant building. In a couple of minutes they finished looking around all the rooms, but they didn't find what they were searching for. There was a locked door not far from the bathroom, however, surely the famous archives were behind it. Keiichi decided it was useless to go on, so he leaned against the wall next to Irie's office. Rena realized they were alone, and an absolute silence reigned in that nearly empty clinic, so she took a seat next to him and she asked him a very particular question:

"Keiichi-kun...would you mind if tomorrow we go the tip, only you and I...?"

"What are you planning to do there? Have you found a new mount needing some scan?"

"Oh...ahuuuu... I could bring some good biscuit and then..."

"Wow, I love them! Sure we should go! But..."

"But... have you some problem? Can't you go with me tomorrow?"

"No... I was thinking about school. We have to help Chie-sensei with the student council, there will be all the kids' parents."

"Ohhhh... you were right, Keiichi-kun..." Rena wondered if Keiichi had understood she was proposing a date. _Maybe he just likes Mii-chan... but when we talk about this he seems so embarrassed, he seems so shy about that subject... No, it was my fault... I should be more explicit. _

Oh, well, it had no importance: as he made her notice, tomorrow's date wouldn't have been possible. So she went on:

"So tomorrow's activity will be about the council."

"Sure, we must prepare reports and..."

"SENSEI! SENSEI, SENSEI!"

Mion's scream brutally stopped their dialogue. The whole group reached at once the door she went through before, which was still open, and they ran downstairs. They arrived to another door, with, on the right side, the presence of a security system which allowed the passage only to the owners of a proper ID card. Giancarlo thought that only staff had it and it would have been a problem, but Keiichi simply pushed the door, and they went through it. _Just as if that device is out of service, or turned off... and it seems still new. A real waste. _

After having passed the door, they came into a corridor, with a lot of rooms. Finding the one where Mion was wouldn't have been hard however, since they could clearly hear her asking for help. They quickly entered in one of the rooms and they found Mion, who was trying to assist Irie, lying on the floor. His glasses were broken, and his head was completely bloodstained.

"I am fine, don't worry... It must be only a intracranial injury, or a concussion... you must go and save her, she must be somewhere here in the basement. He has a metal bar, I don't know where he found it, but..."

"Wait, aren't you saying that Shion is here and she's in danger!" Irie fainted before answering, but he hadn't to say a word to make the others understand the actual situation. Shion was with the doctor, they all knew it, she couldn't have been nowhere but there, in one of the rooms. And somebody else was there, and he could be dangerous. Mion turned pale, scared, but she decided at once to look for her.

"Ali-chan, Gi-chan, bring the doctor upstairs, and then help Takano-san and medicate him. We know this basement better than you, we will find her before something bad happens!". Alice nodded. But suddenly a chill ran down her spine. She rolled over slowly, towards the door. The way was barred.

A young boy, around their age. Young, but quite tall, blond hair, barefoot and wearing a white coat. His eyes full of wrath, his neck full of scratches. A heavy metal bar in his right hand. It was immediately evident that he was completely out of control. He couldn't be but the one who attacked Irie. And he was going to attack them, too.

_Who is he? This Clinic is not a mental asylum. And above all, how to block him?_ Alice hadn't any time to think about an answer. The boy was looking menacingly at his brother.

"You... monster... what do you... want to do... to Satoko? Where... where is...?"

"M-monster?" Giancarlo didn't realize it immediately. Then he understood. He put a finger on his cheek, and then he looked at his fingertip, dirt with black ink.

"Damn, Mion's painting... Please, wait a..." Trying to speak with him was completely useless. The blond-haired boy abruptly started running towards him, at an incredibly high speed.

"Oh my, he's fast!" In just a second he reached him, and he hit him with his bar, aiming for his enemy's head. Giancarlo had just time to protect it with his right arm, but the blow was tremendous. He closed his eyes and he gritted his teeth not to shout, but he immediately held the zone where he had been hit with his left hand. There was a big chance he had his humerus or his shoulder broken.

"You little..." he looked at the armed boy, angry, and he raised his left arm, leaving the hit one, to reply to his attack.

"PLEASE DON'T HURT HIM! DON'T HURT SATOSHI-KUN!"

"Shion!" She was there, partially hidden behind a closet, with some scrape on the face and her arms, but still fine. She was looking for that boy, apparently... _So that boy was Satoshi. What..._

"You should say it to him, too! Or do you rather want him to kill all of us?"

She didn't answer. She was crying, and repeating simply "Please... please..." softly. But the only result of her prayer was to draw Satoshi's attention. He screamed, and he ran fast towards her.

"SHION! RUN AWAY, NOW!" her sister shouted. Shion didn't move, she seemed hypnotized, not even trying to protect herself. She was fixedly looking at her loved Satoshi, repeating his name without moving. She remembered the past days, when he caressed her head, and he told her so many sweet words, full of kindness and sympathy. She saw him approaching to her, but she couldn't simply accept what was happening. He couldn't be that violent. He was the one taking so much care of Satoko-chan, the one who worked hard to buy her that giant teddy bear... He was the one who once understood she was Shion even if she was wearing her sister's clothes... He was her angel, he was the one who loved her, she was sure, so if she went on calling him... maybe...

He didn't hear her, even if he was next to her now. He raised his bar, and launched his attack.

He was blocked. Using a chair as shield, Mion deflected Satoshi's hit, and before he was able to react, she grasped his bar.

"Now help me, Shion! Guys, take him by the shoulders and block him!" but Satoshi was faster. He raised the bar, overwhelming her enemy by force, and he bit painfully her arm. Mion cried out in pain, while Satoshi's teeth penetrated so deeply in her flesh that a squirt of blood came out, and it went directly on his eyes. Blinded, he closed them, leaving the bar which fell on the floor, and he ran away, as a wounded beast. Mion gasped, looking at the blood coming out of her forearm, but she was safe, somehow.

During the following minute nobody told anything, shocked. Then Keiichi went on top of the situation.

"Listen, mates, we must catch him, he could chop off his carotid with his nails, if he don't stop him!" But he looked around, and he understood his friends were not ready to follow him at once. Irie was still fainted, Mion and Giancarlo were wounded, and Shion was still stunned. Only Rena and Alice could help him, and Satoshi could easily find another bar, or another sort of weapon. They had to reorganize.

No, wait, Rena was not there anymore. _Where was she now? What if Satoshi had...?_ That hypothesis paralyzed him. No, here she was. She had gone in the adjacent room, and she had brought a medical kit. _A good idea, but please next time inform us before doing it, it's not a good moment to walk around alone..._ In the meanwhile Rena had opened the box, and she took some bandage and disinfectant, to heal Mion.

"Please wait just a minute, Gi-chan. Once I've helped Mii-chan..."

"Thank you, but before healing me you should go for Irie instead. His head is still bloodstained, and he needs some bandage too. About me, I don't think pomades are that useful, whether this is a fracture or rather just a momentary pain." Rena nodded worried, then he continued: "So, Kei-chan, how are you planning to face that raving mad?"

Shion reacted when she heard that question: "DON'T CALL HIM SATOSHI-KUN THAT WAY!"

"So how should I call him, Shii-chan?" He looked at her coldly "He has attacked three people in a few minutes, probably trying to kill them. Wait, they were four, not three, probably he hasn't been so kind even with you, am I wrong? And once he runs into us again he will attack us another time." Shion didn't find the strength to answer, and she knelt, starting crying desperately. Mion looked at the Italian boy angrily. _You heartless idiot, had you really to make her that desperate?_ He didn't seem to notice her glance, however. He was still looking at Shion, reflecting, then he went towards her, and kneeling in turn he comforted her, while smiling.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to offend him, or to offend you. It has been... the stress of this moment, and maybe this pain which was coming from my arm, too. You know, human relationships... haven't ever been my best quality. Now, let's find him, OK?" Shion nodded, sobbing. "Now, since you are the one who best knows him, where do you think we should look for him? A small and hidden corner? The center of the biggest room?"

"I... I don't know. Maybe I don't know him so well, maybe I don't de..."

"Well, I don't care about this." Mion interrupted them "We will save him, we are the most feared club in Hinamizawa, and I am its president. Or don't you trust me?"

"T... thank you, Onee..."

"Good. Now, first-"

A quick punch on Giancarlo's head.

"OUCH! Hey, I've already apologized!"

"And this is your penalty, as sign of remorse. Second, Kei-chan please guard the corridor, we can't be caught by surprise another time while we're deciding what to do." Keiichi quickly obeyed "Third, you now should go upstairs. Irie-sensei is quite heavy for Ali-chan and Shion, and Gi-chan can't help them that much, so be careful while carrying him. We will go for him, we are three and he's alone, we won't be caught unawares anymore, so it won't be hard. The only real problem is that this basement is quite big, so don't worry if we aren't back at once, have you understood?"

"Don't deal with me as with a infirm! My ache is passing" answered Giancarlo, while standing up "It seems my shoulder has not anything serious. I can help you."

"Rena likes Gi-chan saying that, thank you very much... But as Mii-chan has said before there will be already three of us down here, and Irie must be healed."

"But you're a man and two women, I can't allow something bad happens to you." Rena smiled, but she shook her head, and looked at Mion.

"Ohhhh, have you remembered this old lady is still a girl? You've decided to be a loyal knight, now... Don't you want us to be harmed?"

Giancarlo slightly blushed, crossing his arms: "I still have a bit of pride."

Mion sighed: "OK, let's say it in another way. I'm sure you don't know anything about martial arts, or fighting with a katana and such stuff. Am I right?"

"... Yes."

"You can see it now. You should already know it, I am quite skilled in barefisted fighting, I could defeat you any time I want." He punched his head another time, but this one very weakly, as if it was a fond gesture "So, please don't feel disappointed, if you are sent far from action. It's the best for all of us."

The boy seemed still a bit displeased, but he nodded convinced. "I understand. Let's bring Irie-sensei to a safe place."

"Good, go now, and wish us good luck. We have to search for him now, we can't waste any other time."

Alice, in the meanwhile, was helping Shion to stand up. She didn't say a word during the whole time. She was looking just at the scene, and thinking.

...

Once the other half of the group left them, Keiichi, Rena and Mion started looking for Satoshi. The basement had been nearly abandoned, excluding Satoshi's room, which was now the first one on the left, and which was even the one where Rena had taken the medical kit from, previously. Nearly all of the monitors and the other devices had been taken away by the Banken unit three months ago, but it had not been a problem, for Irie they rather were a nuisance, so most of the rooms was now empty. Still, it was quite a complex structure with rooms, closets and other gateways anywhere. Luckily, once you used the corridor as landmark you could explore it completely, without forgetting any place; moreover, it was not the first time they had gone there. Once a week Takano and Irie cleaned the whole floor, and once a month the members of the club gave them a hand, usually as penalty after a game: they knew quite exactly where each door brought to. So, Rena and Mion started checking each room, while Keiichi got behind them, using the bar Satoshi had left before. The main corridor was L-shaped, so there were a lot of hidden rooms and corners, and a new ambush by him was possible. They had to be ready.

Nothing considerable happened during the following twenty minutes. The girls were checking every spot of the rooms, and, since they had found a _passe partout _in one of the first ones_,_ they were locking them. In this way Satoshi wouldn't have entered somehow into them, in case that he had been able to run away after they had found him, and so he would have been reached again much more easily. Because of the same reason, they had asked Alice to lock the door upstairs, using the key inside one of the pockets of Irie's coat.

Keiichi was a bit nervous, however. _It took just a bunch of seconds to have a look at the upper floor, when we were looking for the archives... why we've already been here for so many minutes, now? If it takes too much time to find him..._ It was nothing strange, the basement was by far bigger than the upper floor. That was really Yamainu's old operations centre. No, he had to calm down. He closed his eyes, and he tried to hear any noise he could. Rena and Mion noticed it.

"What are you doing, Keiichi-kun?" Rena asked low.

"Absolute silence, again." He opened his eyes, again "I can only hear the noise caused by the ventilation system. Satoshi had been here until now, so they kept it turned on. But it's not the most important thing. Not any noise means that he's standing somewhere, without moving or screaming."

"So... are you saying it's waiting for us? Another ambush, then?"

"Maybe. Please be careful, when you open those doors."

He knew it, there was even a worse option he didn't say, not to make the girls worried. _He could already have cut his own throat... _No, it was better not to even think about it. They had to be very careful, in that situation, even if that silence was unreal, and disturbing. He looked at his friends, and he saw them scared. They had a good reason to be so. Suddenly, Rena and Mion had run into a crashed door. Inside, they found all the devices destroyed. An upset table, some broken monitor, some giant hole on the floor.

"Mii-chan, could Satoshi-kun have done this... this mess?"

"I don't know..." _Poor Satoshi. And poor Shion, how will she feel herself now, after having seen the boy she loves acting so violently? _Suddenly, she saw some hole into the wall, and she realized they were misunderstanding the truth.

"No, wait, Rena, this has not been caused by Satoshi-kun. It had been... Kasai." Shion had told her what her bodyguard had done, during the first time her sister went down the basement to save Satoshi. The Yamainu Soldiers wanted to get rid of them thanks to a suppressive gas, but they were just not brave enough to face him, after he started using his pump-action shotgun. That mess was just the result of the battle, not of Satoshi's wrath. They even had already seen that room during their previous visits, and they hadn't completely cleaned it up yet, since the table was bigger than the door; however, they had already planned to smash it up with an axe, during the last time they went there.

"I had completely forgot about this room, I wonder how it was possible. Probably it's because of my strained nerves." Mion hinted a smile, her friend did the same as answer. Then the girls quickly checked the room, and, since they couldn't lock the crashed door, they just went on looking for the following room.

Ten minutes after, they reached the end of the first way of the L-shaped corridor, in order to reach the second one they had to turn left. Keiichi blocked the girls, and, while being hidden behind the wall, he checked if Satoshi was waiting for them.

Rena was worried, she was starting to suffer from Keiichi's same fears... _It is taking too much time to explore the whole area. What if Satoshi has killed himself by ripping his neck with his fingernails..._ After all, after the great fight just before the Watanagashi, she was informed about the Syndrome, just like the others. She was told even about Satoshi's actual disease, which now was still unknown only to the newly arrived, and to Satoko. They couldn't tell her that her brother's state of health was that bad... And moreover, she remembered her period in Ibaraki, far from Hinamizawa... she remembered about her unhappiness, and about the day that she decided to kill kers-

"I've found him" said Keiichi, chasing Rena's bad thoughts "He's at the end of the hallway." Eyeing the bar he was still holding, he decided to show himself, and to challenge him. He was sure to be able to talk to him... maybe even to convince him.

Satoshi was sat on the floor, breathless, thirty meters far from him. He saw the one he still considered as enemy, and he stood up at once. As weapon, he was now using one of those poles they used for plasma transfusions, twice longer and heavier than Keiichi's bar. Well, he couldn't run away now, so he called Satoshi.

The other one started laughing: "Oh, my little dear uncle, so you're finally here to kill me? COME ON, LET'S SEE IF YOU'RE ABLE TO THROW ME INTO THE ABYSS!" He had started laughing, but like a desperate boy, who didn't know how to exit from an anguishing situation.

_His uncle?_ Keiichi thought, _He's talking about Teppei... but... he's been murdered before the Watanagashi..._

Some time before, Rika had told him the whole story, she had been informed about it by Irie. Teppei and his lover were involved in a criminal association, which had committed over a dozen of robberies, and they were killed before escaping with the whole booty, since they didn't want to divide it. _I know about the Syndrome... _b_ut still why is he thinking...?_

Well, during that moment he couldn't think about all the details of the story, of course. Satoshi screamed ragingly, and then started running towards him, waving his weapon. Keiichi wrung his bar, and waited for him.

Thirty meters far.

Twenty five meters.

Twenty.

Fifteen.

Ten.

Eight.

Six.

Five.

Four.

Three.

Three.

Three.

Three.

Three.

Three.

…

"Huh?" Keiichi exited from his state of deep concentration, surprised. Satoshi had stopped. He was painfully panting, like destroyed by an effort, barely able to stand, and he looked even more shocked than him. He looked at him, trying to keep his eyes opened.

"Wh... who... who are you?" Keiichi didn't know what to answer. Satoshi had never seen him, indeed, and this was a pertinent question... He really didn't seem insane now. But what if it was just a moment of lucidity before going on attacking?

Satoshi didn't wait for an answer. He turned his head slowly towards Mion and Rena, who were looking at the scene behind the corner, and they were shocked, too.

"Mi...on-cha...?" asked Satoshi, before finally fainting.

Mion was wordless, looking at him, until she said: "Has he... recognized me?" Rena grasped her arm, and then Keiichi's one.

"We should take him to bed. Rena knows it's not fair, but we should tie him with some rope, until Takano-san or Irie-sensei arrive with some tranquillizer."

...

"Satoshi-kun has really recognized you?" Irie had revived, in the meanwhile, but that discovery nearly made him fainting again. Of course, even the Sercos had been now informed about Satoshi's real story. They had waited for the others' return to ask for it, since they wanted to avoid another fit of tears by Shion (and a punch on Giancarlo's head was already enough). They had been told about the Syndrome too, and they believed to it without having any doubt, after all they had just seen someone affected by its symptoms.

"It's so... so strange, so strange. Level 5 of the Syndrome shouldn't allow him to... but so... the only valid explanation is that he went back to Level 4, or even Level 3... but how is it happened? And because of what?" He thought for nearly a minute, then he decided: "We must find it. Takano-san please help me: blood test, pressure values, EEG... Let's make complete analysis."

Irie was quite excited, and this was not that good for the fragile Takano, who was however able to nod, but only after a couple of seconds.

"Can we help you?" asked Shion, who didn't know if being happy or worried.

"Hmmm...no. EEG takes a lot of time, but it doesn't require that manpower. Moreover, you have not passed good moments, and you are still shaky. You should go home and have some rest. Of course those archives will wait." Keiichi longed for the relieve, then Irie went on speaking:

"Ah, and thank you again, I was really in a bad situation before, the bag containing the tranquillizer we were giving by intravenous injection had emptied and we had forgotten replacing it... It could have been a mortal mistake... But we were lucky. These analysis will give final results only in a couple of weeks, but I hope the best for him, and for all of you."


	9. Meetings and councils

**9 – Meetings and councils**

_Hinamizawa, 10th October 1983_

_- - - - - - -#l#- - - - - - -_

IRIE INSTITUTE

HEREDITARY DISEASES DEPARTMENT

HINAMIZAWA SYNDROME

REPORT #131

9th October, Year of Showa 58

_- - - - - - -#l#- - - - - - -_

Rika was looking at the short dossier Irie had put on the table. She read its title, and when she reached the words "Hereditary disease" she couldn't avoid laughing. After all only Irie and Takano were with her, into the doctor's office. Nobody else was in the upper floor of the Clinic, it was already late, 9:30 PM.

"And since when this Syndrome has just become a _Hereditary disease_, now?" She was really in a bad mood, in that evening.

"Well... this is how this works here, now. Calling it a plague would make our new owners scared, and it would cause us a lot of problems. Once they think it's just a local feature, they won't ask us for anything, it will be just a voluntary study made by me. And, after all, your peculiarities are something hereditary, indeed, so I am not completely lying."

Rika eyed Takano, who was sat on a chair next to the doctor, with her head bowed and without replying anything. After June 1983, the underground organization called _Tokyo _didn't show any more interest in Hinamizawa, and they stopped funding the Institution. So, in order to survive, Irie had sold the Clinic to a private party, which even signed up a little group of doctors to make them work there. The zone was however a calm one, and there were not so many visitors from outside who came there to follow some treatment: the structure didn't need a lot of manpower, so his colleagues came only on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, and they went home at 5:00 PM. The medics, moreover, were not that interested in Hinamizawa and his inhabitants, and they had not a friendly relationship with Irie, for the he was only a colleague of them, and they never talked with them if it was not necessary. The old owner of the institute, then, still could devote a lot of time to his research, for example when he was alone, or whenever no visits were awaited.

"I wonder why they've decided to buy this building, there are so few patients here. I don't think they are going to earn a fortune. But whatever, by agreement they have to keep the Clinic opened at least until 1993, and this is what I really care."

"Unless they decide to bleed them dry and they pay the penalty clause, to pack it all in. But now, I'd say we should go to the core of our meeting, don't you agree, Irie?"

"Ha-ha, you're right, Rika-chan!" he laughed, and he opened the dossier with some difficulty. Irie seemed a bit tired, on the contrary of how he wanted to look like by being joyful and friendly. Taking care of both Satoshi and Takano, and managing the Clinic at the same time was a really hard job, and probably he didn't sleep enough in the last nights, in Rika's opinion. It was not impossible that his tiredness had been the cause of the problem with the empty bag of morphine solution, and of the consequent Satoshi's unforeseen awakening. Shion had even offered herself as full-time helper, but she had no experience, her assistance still wasn't enough. However, the doctor's morale was still high. He was doing that job so feelingly that he hardly was aware of his fatigue.

He finished reading the reports again: "Let's see... Well, the EEG, and all the other exams say he's coming back to normality. I'm avoiding to explain you all the detailed results, you wouldn't understand them."

"So... are you saying he's fine, now? That he has defeated Hinamizawa Syndrome?"

"I'm not sure."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, while he was asleep, the multiple EEGs we made during these two weeks showed that his cerebral activity has become day by day calmer, and similar to a healthy individual's one. It took seven or eight days for this process to finish. So, we decided to run a little risk: we interrupted the dosage of his morphine, and we woke him. We wanted to check the actual level of his disease, and we'll need him to be awaken. You know, all those questions we sometimes make also to Satoko-chan..."

"And the result was..."

"L2." Rika was astonished. Level 2 meant that the subject had still some little paranoia, but he could spend a completely normal life.

"We made some hypothesis about what's happened. Until the moment he attacked your group, Satoshi-kun was still in L5. During the time he was alone, between the two fights, he went down to L4. And afterwards, while sleeping, he reached L3 and finally L2. Of course, I hope to bring him to L1 and to make him completely healed, but this is already an incredible result."

"Quite an elementary thesis. So now is he still awaken?"

"Well... yes. I imagine Satoko-chan and Shion-chan are with him, now." Rika nodded, she agreed with him. She had come to the Clinic with her two friends, and since they weren't in the office with her in that moment, they were quite surely in his room. Shion had known about Satoshi's improvement since a couple of days, while Satoko had been unaware of it until that evening. _Maybe Shii-chan should have waited a few more time, before telling her those good news. Seeing him coming home all of a sudden would have been a marvelous surprise, but on the other hand I know she's not a great liar..._ However, thinking about her little friend's happiness cheered her up, for some second.

"So... Do you know why is this happened?"

"No. And that's why I had previously said _I'm not _sure." Irie went on. "In his blood we found a very strange substance, something I'd never seen before. It looks as an organic molecule, maybe a protein... so we decided to use it for some experiment. You know, even if the Syndrome is caused an airborne pathogen, taking some sample of air allows us to see only the spores of the parasite, and not the parasite itself, our whole research would have been much easier otherwise. Fortunately, those spores were enough for our test. We put them into a little sample of Satoshi-kun's blood... and they had vanished in just a couple of minutes, like they were absorbed into some acid. I imagine that, in his body, even the real parasites have been killed in the same way. Or at least their number has been decreased enough, they are usually located in the brain and next to the other nervous cells, they are not absorbed into human blood, but still they have quite a direct contact with it, and so they can be made nearly inoffensive."

"Could you tell things simpler, please?" Rika was slightly annoyed, so Takano answered, raising her head.

"Ehm... We wanted to say, this protein seems to be our savior... but where does it come from? From an antibody? From his bone marrow? From an external source? We wouldn't know... It won't be that difficult to synthesize it, but we can't do it right now, we'll have to wait some time to have it in a glass tube. Moreover, when he woke up, we took another sample of blood... and that protein was nearly disappeared. So what if, once it's not there any more, the disease affects Houjou-kun again? He could even go back to L5... I... Maybe we should have asked Sonozaki-san not to tell Satoko-chan about this story, it might... be a disaster if his brother begins to show final symptoms again."

Rika was visibly getting angry, but Irie blocked her.

"Wait, Rika-chan, you know how Takano-san can be so pessimist sometimes..." The nurse lowered her head again, as to apologize. Irie was right, especially after the facts of June she looked on the dark side, as if she was irreversibly depressed. That's why she was still in the Clinic, as patient. The doctor continued: "Such substances don't appear and disappear randomly, don't worry. Even normal antibiotics disappear from human blood, once they have accomplished their job, and there is no reason to think Satoshi-kun will reach again L5. If this makes you calmer, I will give him the C117 drug again. That medicine works as vaccine only for who has not still contracted the Syndrome, but the parasites inside Satoshi-kun should be weak enough to make the drug effective. Even better... I should consider combining the protein and the drug, somehow. The former destroys the parasites, the latter avoids their return. No, he won't go back to L5... I... I can assure it to you."

Rika was still nervous. She didn't understand why, but something was disturbing her. "I was forgetting... I hope you've given the C117 even to the Sercos..."

"S-sure... We were told on time that they would have moved here, they were still finishing building their new house, so I've informed their doctor about a local disease and I've sent to Italy a package with the medicine, to give at least two weeks before their departure. Naturally, after what happened in the basement I've explained them its real purpose. The flu they got immediately after their first arrival to Hinamizawa makes me quiet, it means that the vaccine has worked perfectly, they're immune to the Syndrome now. But why are you so angry, tonight?"

"It's... It's nothing. I suppose I have to rest. Have you anything else to add?"

"W-well... We want to take a sample of blood from as many villagers as possible, in order to see if someone else carries that protein. We have already an old data bank, with the blood of nearly half the village, but I'd like to have a complete sample. We've already yours, so-"

"So goodbye, I've a terrible headache. Please tell Satoko I'm going to home alone." Rika suddenly stood up, and went out the room, nearly slamming the door. Once exited from the Clinic, Rika looked at it, then she started running. Irie and Takano looked at each other, they didn't know what to say.

"Rika! Rika!"

Rika stopped running nearly at once, after making sure nobody was following her. Doing so was an automatic instinct, something she had learned some life ago, when the Yamainu soldiers still was a menace. Then she started walking normally, but still worried.

"Rika! Rika!"

Rika didn't know how much time she spent walking, but at least she knew where she was, that old mill she could see was a very clear landmark. She decided to make a detour, and she entered in the wood all around the Furude Shrine. She proceeded inside it for half an hour, and she was approaching home. But she couldn't walk as fast as she wanted to, however, that night was very dark, and any hidden rock could cause her some serious injury. _Why is there so few light here?_ Instinctively, as to find the reason of that gloom, she had looked at the sky. Only a thin and curved white line enlightened the earth, the last new moon had happened only two or three days before. It was not enough to fully see the branches of the trees, and the tight path she was following. She realized she'd have had to follow the usual larger road, but she couldn't go back now.

"Rika! Rika!"

She looked around. She didn't want to talk, but if she hadn't accepted to do so that voice would have continued to infinity.

"What do you want now, Hanyuu?" Rika's eyes were full of anxiety.

"Hauu, don't be so mean! You're so strange tonight, what's the matter?"

Rika stopped, and she looked at her. Hanyuu was worried, she knew it, at the same time she was like a mother and a sister for her.

"I have... I have a bad feeling. A bad presage. People arriving here, Satoshi's attack, that strange new substance... What's going on, here? Maybe I'm just fearful, after all those lives, and all those disasters, maybe I've become too touchy, but..." She was sweating, even if that was a cold night, her heart beating spasmodically. She swallowed, tense as a violin string.

Hanyuu tried to relax her: "Are you sure? Shrine maidens have a lot of presages, it's their job, Hau, Hauuu... I don't feel an-"

"I do, I've said." Rika didn't appreciated that comment. "I'd like everything to always be as it is now. My friends, Satoko, you, I, everyone is so happy, in this blessed world. But something... somebody is trying to destroy the heaven we've so strenuously built. I don't know who, I don't know how, but..."

"Could be someone from _Tokyo _organization? This summer had been quite a humiliation, for some of them."

Rika thought about that. She thought all the times she had to face it, namely, to face the Yamainu, which she believed to be her protector... being killed during all those worlds... being able to save her village with a miracle... She couldn't, she couldn't allow that Hinamizawa had been in danger again, for any reason... All her sacrifices... all the pain she had suffered, would have been useless. She gnashed her teeth because of her anger, scaring Hanyuu.

"I don't know... Why has Satoshi-kun awaken so suddenly? Why had he to do that? This might become so disturbing... How will Satoko and Shii-chan really react to his awakening? Now they are happy, but will they be so even tomorrow, and the day after tomorrow? What if, instead, something goes wrong, and their frustration becomes... I don't know, this is something I've never seen in all my past lives..." Rika was in panic, she found herself in a situation she never lived in. She was used to know what would have happened, she had accumulated a lot of experience, in so many similar worlds. Even when they fought against Takano, in this world, she was perfectly aware of her enemy's identity, of her intentions, and of many other things. But now it was different, she was feeling like she had no info at all. She couldn't accept this, she feared that this lack of experience could bring Hinamizawa towards a new disaster. "I have to look for the truth, I have to know, I have to know... In all these lives I've known everything... everything about everyone here... the only ones I don't know about are..."

…

Far from her, another Hinamizawa city council was starting. And an important guest was between his members.

Sonozaki Oryou hadn't taken part in this kind of meetings for so much time, since before the Dam War. After the insults the Houjous had made against her, years ago, she was used to discuss directly with the Kimiyoshi family in private assemblies, about the various protests to do and the other issues. It was a more practical way to direct the opposition to the Dam, as a real ruler, an unquestioned queen. But she had decided so also because she feared to be publicly humiliated another time, even if she couldn't admit it. But, now, after what had happened that summer, and especially thanks to the strength Keiichi had demonstrated, she had gained in turn some courage, and she had decided to go at that evening's council, with her daughter Akane, who wasn't however allowed to speak during the council, like in nearly all the official meetings. Apart from them, there were three honorable members of the Kimiyoshi family, including their chief Kiichiro, the eldest inhabitants of the village, and, as representative of the local security force, Atsuko Keresana. Globally, seventeen people who had to decide about quite an important subject.

"I declare this council opened" said Kiichiro Kimiyoshi "You should all know about today's agenda."

The others nodded, thoughtful. Kiichiro so went on: "Landslides."

"Hinamizawa is not unused to them, we are next to a lot of mountains here. But usually they didn't happen so often, and thanks to Oyashiro-sama during the last years we didn't run into any of them. In the last two months, instead, we were told about five similar phenomenons. More exactly" he took a piece of paper in front of him, starting to read "on 5th September next to the old forester's building, on 14th just behind Tomizawa-san's house, on 20th and 22nd September in the countryside, and on 2nd October not far from the river, in the proximity of the bridge."

"These have not been large landslides, so I wouldn't call it an emergence situation. Still, we need to find if there are more serious dangers. July has been quite a rainy month, but this is not enough to explain all these events. An old good friends of ours from Okinomiya, Nabiha Seiji-san, recommended an expert hydrogeologist, who will make a complete study of our valley."

"How much time will it take?" asked one of the eldest councilors.

"Hmmm...it won't be a quick work, we've already contacted him. Study of territory, analysis of the flow of the river, orography... He said around sixty days."

"Two months! It's too much! What if a serious slide..."

"You don't have to worry, Kato-san. You haven't to believe we've not taken this in consideration. The expert we named before will make a preliminary analysis, to tell the approximate level of danger, and the most risky zones. Of course, he will be more accurate only after the complete study, but he had assured us that we should be pretty safe even after the first countermeasures."

Kato-san didn't answer, so the silence lasted for a dozen of seconds. Then Oryou started speaking:

"Kimiyoshi-sama, you should know what these lands mean for us. During all these centuries, this valley gave us food, and a shelter, and it still does. Our ancestors defended it in the past, and we have already followed proudly their path, defeating the ones who were trying to destroy it. We all were here to protect Hinamizawa from that fearful project, and we fought for it, and we won. We saved the life of this land, but this doesn't give us the right to kill it now. Therefore, once it's useful to continue guarding the village, I don't see why we shouldn't make these ascertainments... Kimiyoshi-sama, I think you should have proceeded even without the assent of this council, nobody would have said anything against it."

_You always have to scold me, haven't you, Oryou? _But he didn't dare answering in that way, she looked like an old woman but she was still the Queen of the Demons. Instead, he limited himself to declare: "So I'd say everyone agrees with us. Good, I'll contact him and inform him we want this study to be realized."

Everyone nodded. This time they all were sure to do the right thing, and nobody complained. This made Oryou a bit relieved, she still was keeping in mind what had happened because of the Houjous. But finally she had already realized that was really a closed chapter, as that Maebara boy made her understand during the summer. So she closed her eyed for a moment, and then she looked at Kiichiro. He was already told about what was going to happen, so he didn't say anything else but asking the council for silence, and he waited for her to start her speech.

"Good, now that the most important issue on the agenda has been debated, I have an important announcement to do, so please listen to me." She waited for a second, then she kept on speaking:

"My time on this Earth is going to finish. I've ruled my family, and Hinamizawa too, for so many years, and I had to carry this heavy weight alone after my husband's death. I have no regrets, and I'm proud of what I did, so keep in mind that I won't resign because of a guilt, or similar foolishnesses. However, since tomorrow's midnight, my granddaughter Mion will be officially the new chief of the Sonozaki family. Please listen to her decision, and give her good suggestion if you think she needs them."

The others didn't say a thing. They all knew about her health problems, but they couldn't imagine they were so serious. Kimiyoshi was aware that she suffered from a form of cancer which was going worse, and he imagined that probably her doctor (who was not Dr. Irie, but a specialist in Okinomiya who had taken care of here for more than twenty years) had revealed her that she was going to die in a short time, maybe a few months. Otherwise she would have never taken that painful choice.

It was now clear why the heiress of the family was not present. As a traditional rite requested, the new chief was given an old hand bell, a very precious object which had been used in the past centuries to establish who was the ruler, in order to avoid internal fights and feuds and to make the family strong and prosperous. Then, once he or she had got it, the successor had to stay a whole night alone, musing in a little building, which was on one of the mountains owned by the Sonozakis but whose exact location was hidden to the others. As soon as the sun shines again, the rite will be finished, and a new chief will take the control of the village.

It was true, on the other hand, that Oryou was probably too old, and Mion had been taking care of the familiar ordinary matters for already a couple of years. This was just a formal acknowledgment of something which had already happened, even if surely they were going to use a nominee for all the goods of the family, maybe her mother, until Mion is 20. However, Oryou's words were still lofty and nearly arrogant, as to strengthen the role she still had... but... that _Please _clashed with all the remainder of her speech... After all, that old woman had been like an overbearing mother towards the whole village, but during all those years they could feel her patronage without any possible doubt. Suddenly all the old and respectable members of the council were feeling lost, uneasily, like little kids desperately looking for their parents.

Instinctively, Kato wanted to talk to the police officer.

"Keresana-san! Keresana-san!"

The officer didn't even seem to notice his voice. Kato started to be offended, when he remembered what he was told a month ago. He had used the wrong name, before.

"Flavia-san!"

Flavia turned her head and looked at him, smiling. "What's the matter? Please tell me!" They went out the council hall, and started walking outside, alone. Kato asked her:

"What do you think will happen, now, here? A new leader after all this time... If she has to deal with a problem, a menace, will be she able to handle it? I fear that..."

Flavia thought about it for an instant, then she answered: "I suppose it will depend on you. As Sonozaki-sama has just said, giving some good advice to such a young ruler could become decisive."

"It's not that comforting..." Flavia eyed him. He was worried. Then she remembered when her brothers were so little children, and she liked to be like another mother to them. She loved the sensation she was feeling in those moments, so in that moment she decided to act towards him in the same way, to raise his mood.

"Don't you trust yourselves? Once everyone's aim is Hinamizawa's happiness..."

"You haven't been here for enough time. Have you been told about the Dam War? If some serious dispute appears and Mion-chan isn't strong enough..."

"Oryou-sama wasn't strong enough to avoid that feud, too, and she knows that. That's why I'm sure she's happy that her granddaughter is in that sort of "club", she will take advantage of multiple points of view. If I were you, I would care about who wants to create a quarrel, not about who wants to solve it."

"I hope you're right about Mion-chan. The problem is that next year she will have to go to University, and I don't know how much time she will be able to devote to her village..."

"This is her village now, you've just said it. I'm sure that her pride to belong to Hinamizawa is the same than her grandmother's one, and she will do her best for all of you. I can't give you a complete certainty about it, only time can. But I'm trustful, Oryou-sama and Mion-chan have surely considered everything, before taking such a choice. Just wait, and you'll see it." Flavia smiled at him, and he returned, a bit heartened by her sureness, before greeting her and going home.

The young officer observed him while going away, and her mind was full of thoughts and hopes. _Maybe mines were just formal generic sentences_, _but once you see how much those boys care about the village, you conclude that this can't be anything but the truth. I hope that Giancarlo learns from their desire to make._


	10. Suspects

**10 – Suspects**

_Hinamizawa, 11st October 1983_

On her usual path from school to home, Satoko was singing happily. After dinner she would have payed a new visit to her brother, and she would have done her homework next to him. Probably Shion would have been there, too, she could help her with her math exercises if Satoshi wasn't able to do them...

Satoko already knew about the Syndrome, Rika told her months ago, and since she was quite a sharp little lady, trying to lie her about what had happened to Satoshi would have been just useless, but she didn't care that much about his past illness. The most important thing was being with her beloved Nii-Nii again, and the giant teddy bear he presented her in the previous evening made her even more pleased. Irie had asked her to keep Satoshi in the Clinic at least a couple of weeks, just to be sure he was definitely healed, but he hadn't mind about a daily visit by her, on the contrary it was a way to keep Satoshi's conditions continuously checked. Satoshi had a pager, just like Takano, to contact the doctor at any hour, even if he wasn't at the Clinic, but having someone next to him was always better. He even gave her the keys of the main door of the Clinic, just in case she needed them.

Near her, Rika was much less calm. The Sercos had been absent the whole day because of their job, and she hadn't been able to discover anything new about them. She was worried, nearly obsessed... she hardly had noticed that Mion had been absent, too. The new Sonozakis' chief was just too tired because of the musing she made in the previous night. Satoko couldn't be so absent minded not to notice her friend's mood. She looked at her, and she asked what problem she had.

Rika smiled, like an ill girl having a visit from someone beloved "Satoko... Do you think... that Gi-chan and Ali-chan could be hiding something...?" The blond-haired girl didn't expect that kind of question. _Why is she thinking about that, now?_ She was worried... but if Rika had some tangible suspicion she would have made her some more exact question, just like when they fought against Takano. Or she could have directly asked for help to the whole group, she surely could trust her friends. _This sounds rather... fear... _After some second, however, she decided to answer.

"Hmm... maybe."

"Really?"

"Everyone has his own secrets, Rika. Personal facts or feelings you want not to be made public. I suppose this rule is valid for them... and for us, too. Even you have told me not to say anything about the Syndrome to the adults, do you remember?"

"I'm talking about something different..."

"Different? How different?"

"Different since it could become dangerous for them, and for us."

"Dangerous for the whole village? Don't you think they are too young?"

This was not a worthy objection, unfortunately. Satoko couldn't remember about what Keiichi, Shion, Rena, Satoko herself had done in the previous worlds... they were even younger than the Italian twins, but even so... And listening to Irie assuring her that they couldn't be affected by the Syndrome was not enough for her. Okonogi and the other Yamainu soldiers were immune too, for example, thanks to Irie's medicine. Rika's breath was slightly panting, so Satoko, to make her calm, decided to explain to her a detail she noticed some day before:

"Well... do you remember when we've played with the water guns, in the afternoon they had to go to the Clinic to move those archives?"

"Yes."

"Well... I was so surprised when I saw Gian-san's gun like exploding, and wetting his tracksuit". Satoko reminded Rika of what had happened. It was just the beginning of the game. He was looking for a target, and in the meanwhile he rolled up his left sleeve, just as a menacing sign, but when he pulled the trigger all the water in his gun had wetted him, and he had been eliminated. Of course, he had to undress the suit at once, to avoid a pneumonia. "I hadn't eiiher realized he was a lefty, before that day. Do you remember? Even the sleeve of his shirt was wet... but fortunately not that much, it's not a good idea to stay stripped on the waist. You know, these are cold days, we are not in summer anymore. We should change our activities now."

Rika already knew Giancarlo was a lefty. She had observed him writing with the left hand, during past schooldays. _Maybe being left-handed could be a further bad presage? _No, that was too much. She didn't live in medieval times, these superstitions were just stupid and harmful. As priestess, she knew which tales could be plausible, and which one were just a fable.

"But why are you saying it's strange, Satoko?"

"Well, he had been defeated so easily..."

"Oh, Keiichi-kun always does..."

"Yes... but we are talking about someone who had seen that thin wire during their very first day of school, and who had created that system to recognize all the cards of Mion-san's deck... It's not... how can I name it... coherent?"

Rika understood immediately what Satoko meant. _Yes, this must be the strangeness which is making me so worried. _Her friend went on speaking.

"But the strangest part is another one. I didn't remember having sabotaged his gun, and since I'm usually the one who prepares this kind of tricks, I wanted to know who had copied me. You weren't the culprit, am I right?" Rika nodded. "As I had imagined. Well, I really can't say who did it. Winning in this way doesn't belong to Keiichi-san's style, so we can exclude him directly. I've asked the others... and they all claim to be innocent."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes. That gun was quite new, but we had already used it this summer, so it could hardly be an accidental failure, or a manufacturing fault, so..."

Rika touched her forehead with the span of her hand, just like she had a strong headache. "Please, tell me... in your opinion, could... her sister have lied to you?"

"Alice-san? Everything is possible, I've even thought about it, but it still would be strange. First of all, when did she sabotage the water gun? It was the first time she saw them, and she couldn't know where they were. Then... they are twins somehow, if it was not the first time she makes him these jokes he would have been ready to it. Finally, why should she have done it? After the game, she decided to have her face painted exactly like him even if she hadn't to, just for fun... Namely, it would be much simpler if someone else had lied, they could deny being guilty just to use the same trick next time, don't you agree?"

Rika didn't agree. She was still nervous. She was thinking about another hypothesis, as to justify her frame of mind. "And what if... he had sabotaged his own gun?"

"And why should he have done so?"

"I don't know, but, if you remember, he had rolled up his sleeve, maybe he was trying to avoid to wet it..."

"No, Rika. The water made all his tracksuit soaking wet... OK, excluding the right sleeve, but it's the same. Rolling up the left one is useless. Even his shirt under the suit was wet. But we can ask him tomorrow, if you want."

"He'd lie."

"Maybe, but we should try."

Rika shook her head. Her temples were aching, and she had to make sure of everything, as soon as possible.

…

"School time never ends here! I love it."

Alice looked at the time, 4:15 PM. Lesson had just finished, but she couldn't still call it a day. Club activities were going to start in a few time. They just have to wait to Mion to arrive, Irie had asked her to go to the infirmary for some minute, but the Italian girl was ready to fight, visibly impatient. Rena was pleased to see all that enthusiasm:

"Rena likes to see you're happy to be in our club. Rena thinks Ali-chan is nearly scary."

"You're right, I am happy to live these moments, I want to do my best during them... And _that old lady_, as she likes to be called, looks ready to make up for lost time, after yesterday's absence."

"In my opinion she has already made it..." Keiichi still kept in mind the early morning, when Mion had arrived at school wearing a long green kimono, suddenly bursting into the classroom like the Special Forces and drawing her sword against him, as she was a green eyed demon who wanted to take revenge on him.

"But why has she brought a katana at school? I'm not that kind of fighter, and I don't care if she did so while laughing and shouting _Trick or treat, Kei-chan!..._ Halloween is arriving only in three weeks. This time I really feared to die..."

"I didn't know that Halloween Night had reached even this little traditional village..." noticed Alice.

"We could say it's the effect of globalization... However, that was not a katana, but a nodachi, Kei-chan." Shion explained "They are quite different weapons, even if, to tell things short, a nodachi is a longer sword, basically. The Sonozaki family has some katana too, obviously, but they are old and worthy for us, so she had preferred not to carry here such a dangerous weapon. You should be grateful."

"Grateful for being menaced and - supposedly - killed only by a _normal_ nodachi instead that by a precious katana? Oh, it's a real honour! Still, declaring war here should be considered a crime against humanity, nowadays! And she hasn't been punished!" Thanks to Satoko's help, Mion had been able to change her clothes and to hid the sword, before Chie-sensei's coming.

"Come on, Kei-chan! She didn't plan a mass genocide... At least I don't think so. But if are mean with her, she could change her mind..."

"How can you be th-" Keiichi's unfair protest had been gently interrupted. The blade of the nodachi appeared again, and it was just by his neck.

"Kei-chan, Onee is Onee, and even if my main aim is guarding Satoko-chan, I can't ignore your impolite words towards her." Keiichi froze, terrified, while Shion smiled innocently, as if she was holding a doll instead of a mortal weapon. Well, she was happy and ready to joke, that day. Satoshi was fine, and a bright future was waiting for her.

"Can I see that sword, Shii-chan?" asked Alice. Shion lowered it, saving Keiichi's life, and she held it out to her.

"It's quite a long sword... the foil I'm used to is so short, compared to this."

"Ah, so are you keen on fencing?" asked Satoko, while finished arranging a bucket reserved for a certain target.

"Well... I'm not that good. A cousin of mine is much more skilled... but I can proudly say I can defend myself."

"You should go to our Manor to challenge Mommy, then." proposed Shion "She always looks for new opponents... Of course, if you accept she'd use a proper weapon, similar to your foil."

"Oh, that would be nice!" While hearing this, Shion giggled, Alice didn't know what fighting against her mother meant.

"So were you in a fencing club, in your Italian school? And were you the leader of it, were you?"

"Hmmm... no. You know, it's the first time I'm in a school club."

"Ohhh... Really?"

"Sure. In Italy there are such organizations, too, but you are not obliged to join them at all, and I don't think there are a lot of schools with a fencing club. So _most of boys_ do something else... Something unrelated to school, I mean. Being part of a football team, joining a group of friends, or making new friendships, and so on. Ah, and of course having some date with your boyfriend." She solemnly nodded.

"Ohhh..." Shion was particularly interested in the subject. "I am sure it took at least a month for you to approach him and say _I love you_, next to the sea, during the sunset, or in the most romantic scene ever possible, while blushing and having your eyes bright..." If Mion had been present in the room, Shion would have looked caustically at her while saying this, and her sister would have directed her glance elsewhere, annoyed... _How much time will it still take for her to come here?_, she thought.

"Romantic...?" Alice shook her hand. "Uh, no, I wouldn't say so. We were coming back from school, we both have understood we wanted to live together, I've asked him if he wanted to be my boyfriend and he has accepted. Very simple, very quick. No useless gift, fattening chocolate or flowers you have to throw away after a couple of days."

Shion and Rena, looked at that monster, frozen. They had never imagined that one of the most important moments of a girl's life could be so aseptic and emotionless.

"Ara ara, I like this kind of attitude..." exclaimed Satoko "It's something very rational, I'd dare saying. Clear-headed and mistake-proof, no possible misunderstanding."

"But, I wonder, I wonder... does it work?"

"I'd say so. They have been engaged since they are 14, so this strange love story really works..." her brother added, while Rena was taking note "Anyway, we've known Alberto since we were little kids, don't think Nee-chan has decided to have an unknown boy as boyfriend, now. They spent so much time together during their childhood that everyone at home knew how it was going to end. Wasting any time with a preliminary courting would have been stupid..."

"Ah, Nii-chan, you are so mean, he was not a foreigner, for sure... However, it was a pity that Alberto is an only child, you know."

"What do you m... No, now I've understood what you mean! You'd have liked me to be engaged with her sister, if he had one, am I right?"

"More or less... A quick choice, an effective declaration, and we're all happy. We could have even saved some money for our weddings, in that case..."

"It can't be! This is not my model of a romantic story!" Shion protested "I want something nobody can forget, not such a shabby sketch! But... if you don't care these kind of moments... I suppose that without having any doubt your boyfriend and you have already made se-"

A nudge on Shion's head, and one at Alice's chin.

"Shi-chan is not supposed to make this kind of questions with little children around, and Ali-chan is not supposed to answer!" Rena The Great Moralizer had just spoken.

"Tsk, so you're the only one of the family who's a single?" Keiichi appeared behind the Italian guy, and he starting touching his right shoulder to tease him.

"Well, I didn't think males enjoyed love matters so much..."

"Oh, I'm really an expert, please open your heart..."

"I don't think you're the most suitable for this."_ Two girls love you hopelessly and you haven't neither noticed it, and still do you claim to be Cupid?_ The war between Rena and Mion to achieve Keiichi's heart was plain for all to see, only a blind or a Maebara could ignore it.

"Oh, don't say it. Bringing you to a calm place, where you can feel yourself comfortable... make you start talking about from the causes, your inner doubts and scares... using a logic process... and considering all my personal experience... there's no chance I can fail."

"Have you heard what I've just said?"

"About my hypothetical inadequacy? Why are you thinking so?" His finger touched Giancarlo's shoulder with more strength "I can go directly to the core of your problem, and when I reach it..." He took his wrist with the other hand, and "ZAAAAAC! I'll cut it into two perfectly equal parts!" he shouted, imaginably cutting his friend's whole arm with his finger, as if it was a sharp knife. So, with an offhanded gesture, Giancarlo removed Keiichi's hands from his body, annoyed.

"But, _please_, stop mocking me in that way! Are you talking about love or about a watermelon? Let's start this stupid game now, I don't like waiting too much."

"Oh, you are serious. OK, so if you lose today's activity you'll have to accept our aid, we'll create a specialized company and we'll name it _Broken Hearts_..."

Shion laughed. "You're right, Kei-chan. And I'm going to be its manager... I already know where to look for. There are a lot of pretty waitresses at the _Angel Mort_ who'd probably like to meet some interesting guy..." The addressee of the invitation blushed, and the members of the club all laughed. Except Rika.

"Gii, can I ask you something?"

The other didn't know if she wanted to kid him, but he agreed: "Hmmm... Yes, why not..."

"When Keiichi-kun has said _ZAAAAAC_ and has cut your arm, why have you gnashed your teeth?" The other looked at her. Nobody had noticed such a thing, neither Rena.

"Hm? I've really done so?"

"Yes."

Even Giancarlo wasn't sure about it. _Maybe I've really gnashed them without even noticing it... That would have not been strange... Well, whatever._ He addressed Rika to answer: "Well... You should have understood. I'm not like Nee-chan, who talks about her falling in love and about her feelings as she would do about today's weather. I think that privacy is a right of mine, and I want to defend it."

Rika didn't answer, so he imagined the matter was closed, then Shion started speaking: "Now, we should make some proposal about today's game. Of course, once _our beloved president _arrives, she'll be free to say her opinion."

"O_ur beloved president? _Shii-chan is just too cruel!"

"Why are you saying so, Rena?"

"Oh, my, this villain can't find even the irony hidden in our sentences? You're hopeless."

"Hey wait a second, Satoko! Where do you think... OUCH!"

"Ho ho ho ho!"

"This bucket, again! When have you prepared it?"

"Oh, Keiichi-san, you should be more careful, it's such an elementary trap..."

"Let's see if next time..."

"It's a lie."

Everyone stayed quiet hearing those words, astonished. Rika was eying menacingly Giancarlo, who in the meanwhile had caught the sense of that sentence at once.

"Why do you think that was a lie?"

"Because I know it. I am sure of it. Now I've found which one of you two was the real problem. Blow the whistle, what are you hiding from us?"

Satoko approached her: "Rika, what ar-"

"AND LEAVE ME!" Satoko had put her hand on Rika's shoulder, but her friend didn't appreciate it. She pushed her to the ground. Her eyes showed everything, she was angry, even more than in the previous evening, when they were walking alone, and Rika had talked about her first doubts. She was so out of control that Satoko couldn't recognize her friend, and she was scared by her.

Giancarlo looked at Rika, thoughtful. _She's just a little child... but where do these words come from? I... I don't think I've done something bad against her... at least I didn't mean to do that. Maybe she just hates me because I'm a foreigner... But that question... seems... so serious..._

"Rika-chan" he finally answered, kneeling next to her "Love, as the other deep feelings, are something very important for people. It's not strange that I talk about that only to a little group of people, or that I don't talk about it at all. You will unders..."

"Don't treat me as a little child!". She was looking on the ground, angrily.

"Rika-chan, you are exaggerating now, you do are a-"

"TELL ME, NOW! WHAT ARE YOU PLANNING TO DO? WHAT'S YOUR BIGGEST FEAR? WHO ARE YOU, REALLY?"

Silence. The whole group didn't know what to say, or what had happened to Rika. Her eyes were tremulous, her tone of voice was altered. She just seemed possessed by something... by a strong fear. She wouldn't have moved without an answer. On the other hand, usually Giancarlo couldn't stand such aggressive people, on the first day even Mion had made him nervous. Still, she was a little kid... after some moment of hesitation, he united his index and middle finger, and he symbolically hit Rika's head with them.

"Bad girl. You shouldn't say these things, and not with that tone. Don't you understand it's not a good way to find new friends, and to go along with the others?"

"I've already clearly told you not to consider me a nursling." Rika didn't get calm, on the contrary those baneful words removed any doubt about it. If she hadn't been that small, compared to him, maybe she would have even attacked him.

"I'm not treating you as a child. What I've said is worthy for little kids, grown adults and old pensioners. As for me, my daily activity is over, I think it's better for me to go away right now. Please tell Mion-chan I apologize for this." He took his bag and he exited from the school. Alice followed him rapidly, concerned about him: "Wait, Nii-chan!"

They walked for more than half an hour without saying a word. Alice knew his brother, she only had to wait for some time, to make sure his rage had cooled down. He didn't show it at school, but he was angry.

Finally she spoke: "Nii-chan, I know she had been rude, but..."

"I am not that patient, Alice... I am not like Flavia. I know she's an orphan, but she needs some more politeness and good manners. She should have a sort of tutor, or somebody who is responsible about her attitude. Do you know who is he?"

"I don't know... However, please, don't be so stubborn, once in your life. Wait some day and..."

"Wait... until I've just forgotten, as usual?" Alice smiled, she had just convinced him "Well, I'll give her another chance, but I hope she'll keep her hair on, next time."

In that moment they heard a honk from a coming car. It was Flavia.

"Hey, guys, shall I drive you to home? It will be a very nice chance to use this hooter once again..."

"Using it randomly once hasn't been enough, for you?"

"Sigh, why are you so rude? Damn, this place is too peaceful, when I was told about the Curse I hoped to run everywhere while never resting... OK, I recognize it would be a problem if someone notices me while doing it again, so it will be better acting in an orderly way." In that moment she looked better at them, and she realized something had been wrong "What's the matter? Please tell me." They got into the car, and they explained to her what had happened.

"_Ahi ahi ahi,_" she finally answered after they finished "You know they are young and that they just want to play..."

"There are nicer ways to play."

"Well, you should teach to them, if you think so."

"I'm not a good teacher."

"Then don't blame them!" Flavia laughed, but then she didn't say anything for some second, before asking. "It was Furude-chan, so? That blue-haired girl who guards the Shrine?"

"Yes..."

"It's curious, then." Alice's glance invited her to go on. "Just a hundred meters before finding you, beyond the turn... I ran into her. She was alone, walking in your same direction."

"It's quite strange she's not with Satoko-chan. They always go to home together. So... probably she was looking for us, and I think to apologize." Alice looked at her brother, smiling. "Have you heard it, Nii-chan?"

"I wouldn't be that sure." Flavia had turned suddenly serious "Her look didn't make me think about someone who was sorry."

Alice had a bad presage: "What do you mean?"... and Giancarlo was the one who answered to her question:

"She was not looking for us to apologize... she was there to keep on eye on us."

…

That evening, a very heavy rain was falling, autumn had really arrived. Inside their house, Alice was looking at her brother, worried. He was next to the window, very uneasily. He had seen her. Her big dull eyes, her long wet hair, her opened hand leaned on the glass.

Behind that window, Rika Furude was watching inside, and spying them.


	11. Desire to stalk

**11 – Desire to stalk**

_Hinamizawa, 13rd October 1983_

In an old car, Oishi was smoking his first cigarette of the day. He checked the time, it was very early in the morning, then he looked through the driving mirror at the back seat, where a little child had made a specific request.

"Do you know I had officially retired two months ago, don't you?"

"I know it." answered Rika "But still I need your help. I can't trust the new inspector."

"Flavia-san? And why? She seems such a trustworthy officer... Do you have some detailed information that makes you question her?"

"Not exactly. Let's call it... familiar implication."

"Oh..." Oishi had already understood the subject of the research she was asking for. He had worked in the police for more than 30 years, he knew exactly what that kind of sentence really meant. "So, what do you want, exactly?"

Rika paused momentarily, then he explained:

"I want you to discover everything you can about Flavia, Giancarlo and Alice Serco. About their family and their past. Every strange detail, everything that could be suspicious in your opinion."

Oishi looked at the sky. "It won't be easy... It will be similar to an internal inquiry, Flavia-san must not to know..." But, after all, he owed her a favor, after she helped him finding the truth behind all the deaths during the past Watanagashi. And not being on duty any more had made him bored in that period, having worked with the prefect was not enough for him, he needed some action. "Well, OK. I'll do what I can."

Rika sneered, satisfied. Hanyuu was desperately going on calling her, but she didn't answer.

...

"So? What's your opinion about it?"

Rika had not gone to school, that morning. Satoko reported that Rika had come to home very late in the night. Very probably she had spent nearly all that time trying to spy them, and, after having slept just for two or three hours, she had told her friend she didn't feel well. So, the principal asked Chie-sensei, Mion, Giancarlo and Alice to reach him in his office, to discuss about the matter.

"Staying outside with that rain... Maybe she was telling the truth." said Chie "She might even have got a bronchitis, or something similar. We can't let her that little girl alone." Giancarlo mentally agreed with her, but not because of her illness.

"You should have invited her inside." His thoughts were interrupted by Mion, and so he turned his eyes at her. She was looking at them quite seriously, like an adult who was watching younger people. _It's quite ironical, we're older than you, actually. Maybe she is even blaming us._.. No, the truth was rather that she was feeling like having to behave much more responsibly in those moments, especially after her recent official investiture, but he couldn't imagine it. Still, she had a good point, so Alice answered to her:

"We would have done so, if we could. It would have been a good moment to clear things up with her. But, each time we opened the door and went out to call her, she escaped quickly somewhere, and we could do nothing but come back in. Once it had got late, we decided it was useless to stay awake, and we went to bed."

"Hmmm... It's not strange, from her. Hiding herself has always been one of her best gifts." Chie-sensei explained "But I really can't imagine why her behavior has so suddenly got that worse." To be fully honest, her students had already noticed that she had changed after what had happened between Satoshi and them, and that there was a high chance that such an event had had a relevant role in it. Chie's words had reminded Alice how Rika had turned pale when she was told that story, and how much silent she had been in the following days, before that sudden outburst. But they couldn't say it openly to her, Chie-sensei and the Principal were unaware of Satoshi's real situation, and after all they weren't even sure about it.

"So?" asked the Principal "What are you planning to do, now, Alice-san?"

"Well... She's the chief of the Furude family, beloved and respected by everyone here. We can't underestimate her attitude towards us, but she is still a little child. I suppose she has a foster parent by law, or someone who anyway takes responsibility of what she does. We are going and seeing him, to find a solution. I hope he'll be able to make her understand this is not an acceptable behavior."

"Hmmm... well, it's not a bad idea... but there's a problem."

"What are you referring to, Mii-chan?"

"As you've just said, she's the Maiden of the Furude Shrine... and everyone loves her. If you go and tell what's happened, all the villagers will know that she has suspects about you, that she thinks you are bad people. You should know what this means, you're country boys too."

This was... unexpected. But she was not wrong. Scandalmongers inside these little villages can be much more dangerous than anything else. If everyone in Hinamizawa had started looking at them distrustfully, they'd have suffered a sort of spiritual isolation, and being seen as foreigners might just make things worse. Nobody would have wanted them to stay there any more, just like the Houjous some year before. And what if... what if Rika decided to publicly declare her distrust, for example while they were at the market, or during a religious rite? They would have been considered like pariahs by the whole community. Of course, they weren't the Houjous, they could move from Hinamizawa without any problem, and that was just an extreme case, but Alice understood they couldn't take the situation easily, even if Rika was just a little girl.

"Ah, the importance of your role... if I were in Serco I could slap her on her face until she had changed her mind, but you're right, we're guests here and we have to follow your rules. So, what's your proposal?"

"I'd like to talk with her about this story. I wasn't in the classroom when that case had happened, and when I've arrived all of you had already left, so I want to listen to her point of view too, before making a definitive judgment. But it seems she's not at school today, so..."

Giancarlo, as usual, was just observing them, while the Principal was making a long speech about relationships in school. And he was thinking. _I don't understand if she wants to help us or she wants just to protect Rika by a poor figure... A sort of invisible help between the Great Families? And moreover... just ten minutes ago she was kidding joyfully with Kei-chan, as a normal teenager... or a tomboy, at least, she was even betting on who had the longer penis between the two of them! So, could this kind gentleness, this carefulness and courtesy... be just a mask? She seems much more interesting in playing into the club... This must be their way to be a chief, a ruler, then. Yes, this is the truth. During the first day of school, I had hoped to have seen a human and delicate side of her, but in the end she's only an insensitive hoyden..._

He was surprised by noticing himself thinking _Well, she has just chosen who she has to take care of. This is a much better way to find happiness. Don't you agree? _He looked down, depressed. _This... this is the path I've chosen. I don't have to regret it. If this can make Alice and the others happy, I'll go through it proudly. _In that moment the phone rang, and the Principal stop speaking to answer. After some second he gave the receiver to Mion.

"It's your mother, Sonozaki-san. She has something important to tell you, something about Furude-san, she said."

She talked on the phone for a couple of minutes, then she hung up, disquiet.

"Rika-chan has just been at my house. She was asking my mother... for a research. A sort of inquiry." They all turned serious, now. Saying the subject of that research was useless. "Rika-chan wanted my family to use all our private channels and contacts to discover... Well, you know." She was saying those words sorrowfully, she nearly looked to feel guilty of her friend's behavior, now. _Being wrong now is painful, don't you know it?_ "Fortunately, my mother, instead of listening to her, has immediately asked her why she wasn't at school, and she hasn't wanted to answer, so she has asked Kasai to drive her here: I suppose he has done so by force, I don't think she wanted to come here."

Alice was still worried: "I'm beginning to think that she shouldn't live alone just with Satoko-chan. I don't want to be mean, or cruel. I'd just say she needs an adult, someone who guide her and who reproaches her when she's wrong. I don't know her full story, but having a real parental figure would be very precious for her."

"We've taken care of them for many years, and they had never shown such a resentment towards someone before. This has been a casual event, I wouldn't say that what you're proposing might have given better results."

"Talking about this... maybe it's my fault." Behind the door, Satoko had listened to the dialog. And the whole club was there, too. They all were worried about their little friend, and they wanted to make sure about what was happening, they couldn't stay in the classroom and ignore it. The blond-haired girl came then forward, and she told about their discussion about the incident with the water guns. Giancarlo touched his watch, and Alice looked at her dejected.

"Oh, my, I couldn't imagine that an exploding gun could cause so much trouble. Things like this continuously happen, what was she thinking about, a conspiracy?"

Satoko agreed with Alice, nodding. "I know it... and I've told her that everyone has something he doesn't want to talk about. But... she..." a tear came out of her eye "She seems so obsessed, even yesterday she was so strange, so nervous. I can't recognize her, she is so different from the Rika I've always known..." Shion hugged her, to support her.

In that moment, they heard the noise of a car. Kasai and Rika had arrived. The others didn't say anything, and they all looked at the door of the office. After a minute, Kasai appeared. She was holding Rika in his arms, since the girl didn't want to come in, and she was continuously kicking the air. She had no scratches on her neck, or on her wrists. To try to give an explanation to her behavior, some of the members of the club even imagined she might have suffered from the effects of the Syndrome... but Irie, and Rika herself had clearly told them her role as Queen Carrier. She couldn't contract that disease, she was immune.

Finally Kasai left her, and she eyed the others, searching spasmodically for the one she feared the most. So, Mion approached her, and she asked her what the reason of that behavior was, but Rika didn't answer, looking elsewhere. Then, the pony-tailed girl again asked her to answer, reminding her that both of them represented one of the Three Great Families, and that this was a formal request, which she was to reply to.

"Oh, since you're so important and you have such a big power, why don't you order Keiichi to fuck you, then?"

A peremptory smack was Mion's answer to Rika's offense. She was really angry now... Rika had jeered at her role, both of class leader and of chief of the Sonozaki family, but also at her feelings. She wasn't used to be that violent, she even didn't avail of her knowledge of martial arts that often, excluding training and the past war against Yamainu. But this time she couldn't avoid it. She raised her eyes, towards Rika, still nervous. And she got even more furious. That little girl was crying because of the pain, but the anger in her eyes clearly showed she wouldn't have surrendered even after such a strike. Mion said:

"Rika-chan... I trusted you... and I still trust. But until now I thought that there could be something strange you had noticed, that you had acted so for a reason..." _I knew it... They care her much more than us_ "Now, instead, how can I even imagine you are right? Do you really think we are just useless featherbrains? Look around you, we've always helped each others, don't you think we may be here because we're worried of you?"

"You've _always_ helped each others? Are you really sure of it?" Rika neither listened to her appeal. Evilly sneering, she added, smiling like a devil: "Don't make me laugh! But look at yourself in the mirror! You're just a pathetic young girl who thinks to be wise and strong like a god just after she has given a nice colored bell! Do you think this makes you a better person? You are too stupid not to be a poor weak child, having too big dreams for her! Building a joyful Hinamizawa, as if it is as easy as drawing a panorama? Seeing your descendants living happily? Do you really think to achieve that, if you keep on being so simple-minded? Ah, haven't I already seen it? Oh, sure I've seen it! You are alone now, you'll be always alone, you'll die alone!"

_Here it is, now Mion will lose her temper and come to blows with Rika. It will be funny to see how she's going to smash her face, after having defended her... However I'd better not to say a word now, my participation would only make things worse..._

Giancarlo was wrong. He got stunned, when he realized Mion couldn't even find the strength to react. She wasn't able to understand why a so dear friend had become so cynical towards her, they had known each other since Rika was a baby... And so, exactly like what her sister some had done some week before, she started crying, asking Rika _Why? Why?.._. Shion and Rena tried to comfort her, while Satoko was still shocked, after having heard what her little friend had said, and Alice looked at her brother, sorry to be, indirectly, the cause of that harsh quarrel. Everyone had the feeling that some strange word were sounding weakly in the air, some word similar to "I'm sorry"...

Keiichi decided to react. He angrily approached Rika, and he asked the meaning of that behavior, but Rika didn't care answering. The noise inside the office was increasing, most of the presents were now shouting, or talking aloud.

"Why aren't you saying anything, Rika-chan? Answer me, at least!"

"Should I, Keiichi-kun?" Rika's glance now was sending a will of defiance.

"Sure, you should! Have you forgotten what have you done for us?"

"Hmpf, I was sure you would have said something about what YOU have done for me, not the contrary."

"You've said it, so you're recognizing it. And still you are hurting all of us that way? What have we done to deserve it?"

_She is still a young girl, even after that rite she has her own feelings... but if I didn't think she was so sensitive. I have misunderstood her... I was mean, really. I owe her a favor._

"Rika-chan has been so cruel with Mii-chan!" exclaimed Rena, next to her crying friend. "And she just wanted to do anything was good for you!"

"Are you sure it's better for me? What if I'll be killed again?"

"Killed again? Who wants to kill you again?"

"What's this story of being killed?"

"HAHAHA! You know nothing, and you still think to help me?"

"ENOUGH! You are overstepping all the possible limit!"

"If I don't know, I can't be sure..."

"So you don't know? It's a fantasy of..."

_This is something happened because of me, we could say. I can't just stay here quiet. We must settle it as soon as possible._

"Fantasy, are you saying? Ha, I thought you trusted me before..."

"I still trust you, but you can't start attacking everyone now!"

"If you say this, you can't claim you trust me, then!"

"But Rika, please!"

"And so what? I have my conscience, I'm still free to say that you're wrong."

"It's very interesting. So, explain to me why I am wrong, now."

"Please stop now, Rika-chan, you can't say this!"

"Do you want so? Very well, just consid..."

"Rika." a calm voice broke that atmosphere. No honorifics used, she was not called _Rika-chan_... just _Rika. That word hasn't been said aloud, how could I hear it so clearly in that chaos? _Even the others had stopped speaking, after having seen the expression on her face. With that doubt in her head, the blue-haired girl turned her eyes at who spoke it.

Giancarlo had sat on one of the chairs by the desk, and he was observing her. His nearly closed eyes, his elbows on the desk, allowing his chin to be leaned on his hands. His calmness was unnatural, especially in that situation. Rika wasn't sure, but she got the impression that his hazelnut colored eyes had slightly darkened. But, most of all, she clearly was aware of the fact the air inside the office had suddenly become heavier, she was breathing with great effort. She was excited, strangely happy... _Yes, this is what I expected... I knew it, I knew it. I was sure of it. I'll defeat him, and I'll change my fate another time..._

"_Rika"_ he repeated "since this is a matter between you and me, you shouldn't involve the others that way, your relationships with them may be irreversibly damaged. We should talk alone about this story, here and now. Don't you agree?" His icy glance was as an incitement to her, they both wanted to arrange that situation right now, alone. His sister looked on the ground, seemingly resigned, as if things couldn't end differently.

Rika thought about his words, and then she laughed, excited, accepting his challenge: "Very well, then. Let's bring these annoyers out of here, and we'll see..." He didn't reply, but he stood up and he asked the others to go out.

"Are you sure?" asked the Principal, who was still the owner of the office "I hope you don't want to..."

"You shouldn't worry. I won't go to jail because of her. Please go now." His face had nearly no expression, and he had closed his eyes completely, as if he was waiting for everyone to go out of there. He stood so for twenty or thirty seconds. But a soft noise was disturbing his concentration. He opened them again, and looked at Mion, who was still sobbing, accompanied out of the room by her sister. _She doesn't need my encouragement, she has so many friends... _

But immediately after that he remembered what he had thought some second before, when he was sure she would have never cried... _I was wrong, before... Well, if I had been wrong before... probably mine will be just a bad figure, but... _He called her, and her sister and she stopped. He approached them, without saying a thing, and he punched Mion's head gently, similar to the endearing hit she had given him in the basement of the Clinic, some week ago. "Well, if after this you still _pretend _to be a hoyden, feel free to do so. But you should learn not to cry that way." He smiled "Otherwise, I will have to consider you as something else..."

She looked on the ground, without answering immediately. Then: "Gi-chan?"

"Yes?"

"YOU HURT ME, YOU IDIOT!" Her precise and powerful right made him see stars, while the others couldn't believe in what they had seen, before laughing, relieved. Of course Rika didn't even smile... but... the heavy air she had been breathing before... had disappeared.

"That's... not... fair!" It was his turn to weep, now. "This is the last time I'm listening to my conscience!"

"You've been the one who started punching, you can't deny it! Now this old lady is tired of taking care of you fools, so now deal with it alone!" Then while he was reviving, the others went out, leaving them alone. Rika looked at him... But she was still feeling uneasily. She was expecting a fight against a fierce enemy... not a chat with someone still sat on the floor.

"Are you thinking that it's a pity that that sort of dark aura has disappeared, am I right?" Giancarlo read in her mind, while looking at the ceiling "I can understand it, and I agree with you. I'd have preferred an epic duel, honestly, and this is what I was expecting – you've seen how I had got ready, on that chair. But I don't know why Mii-chan has decided to play down everything that way... Well, maybe she's right, we're not mortal enemies, at least we weren't so until now. So, could I know what has happened to you?"

Rika didn't answer, hesitating. So Giancarlo spoke again, and he exclaimed: "I think you and I are quite similar, after all."

"Do you think so?" Rika was trying to be on her guard, but she couldn't make out whether he was serious or not.

"Yes... And that's the reason of this hatred of ours, I fear. We are both quite pessimist, and you think that what you don't know about me can become a danger. But what about _your _mysteries? You do seem to have some of them."

"Once I've told you to ask for everything you want."

"You're right, but how could I ask you about the Yamainu, or about the Syndrome, for example? These facts sound so strange and unreal that even thinking they've really happened is nearly impossible, in the beginning. To ask for them I've had to be attacked by a guy with a white coat in the abandoned basement of a sort of hospital..."

Rika nodded. _He couldn't even suspect about all the worlds I've lived in. He, and the others too... They will never be completely aware of them, even if they sometimes remember a detail, or have a dream._ Then she said: "I am just... protecting my world... protecting my heaven." She felt disappointed, somehow. She was realizing she had not an enemy in front of her, those presages were surely not his fautl.

"Your heaven?"

"Yes... after what had happened to Satoshi-kun... I feared that Shii-chan, or Satoko... could be driven crazy..."

"And why should they?... Ah, sure, the Syndrome... Well, Satoshi-kun's awakening should be a positive event, not a source of stress."

"How can you be that sure... Human minds are so... unpredictable, sometimes. It's something I learned some time ago, Keiichi-kun showed it to me a lot of times. Maybe Shii-chan could have become jealous of Satoko, and so..."

Giancarlo didn't answer immediately. Then: "I can't know what will exactly happen, I am not God. But can I ask you something else?" Rika nodded. "Were you really thinking that a world where Satoshi-kun was still suffering from the Syndrome, and where he had to stay far from her sister and her girlfriend... A world where Shii-chan and Satoko-chan were sad because of his absence... Were you thinking that that world... was your heaven?"

Rika opened her eyes wide. _He's right... I... I pretended to take care of Satoko and Shii-chan, but... I wanted things not to change, forever... and so I was afraid of their greatest wish, and in my heart I hoped it would have never happened... _

"Well... I'd say it was the best world I could wish, but you're right... _I'm sorry._" Those last words were usually Hanyuu's line, but she wouldn't have protested for having lent it to her. Her ancestor's spirit was behind her, accompanying her as during all those days, and she was now visibly relieved. Visibly from Rika's point of view, of course. So the little girl went on: "OK, I give up trying to discover everything about your past, present and future life, I just hope your dreams and/or fears aren't making you planning to destroy and/or conquer this village, that would be frustrating, after all this chaos."

"Naaah... this is a too little place." he answered ironically "If I really wanted to do something similar, I'd aim at a bigger city, _and/or_ directly at a major Country, don't you agree?"

"Hmph, this guy dares kidding me, and underestimating Hinamizawa, now..." Then she added "Can I tell you a thing? I'll never trust you wholly, I'll always prefer Keiichi-kun..."

He eyed her annoyed, but he wasn't angry. She was smiling, now.

"Well, I think that a truce is the most I can obtain, am I wrong?"

* * *

**Author's note: Well, what's the sense of these last 3 chapters? Let's call it a trial. Rika has known the others for so much time... so I think it's normal for her to have doubts about the newbies, and this story will have some consequence even later on. After all, I had to wait for Irie to finish his research, he'll show its result in the following chapters, after a short TIP.**


	12. TIP: Forgotten Worlds II

**TIP: Forgotten Worlds II**

Please have a rest tonight, Hanyuu. You'll have to bring me to another new world, soon.

Teppei has disappeared. They haven't seen him since two days, and Shion is at her home, her sister has told us that she's raving into her bed, and that we'd better not to go and pay her a visit. It's not difficult to understand what has happened.

Oishi has visited too many times Hinamizawa's school, in this last period. Might he suspect something? But Shion has never attended school here. She escaped from St. Lucia Academy more than a year ago, but I've never seen her in our school. Probably she went to Okinomiya's one, far from her sister, and from Satoko. However...

However also Mion is getting more and more aggressive, especially towards me... I fear this world will end like the one where I wasn't able to drug her with the C120 medicine, if I had did so she would have died quickly, without inflicting so many tortures to me, and Satoko. Satoko, that's right... she's becoming so scared by Mion... and this just because, in the last couple of days, that young woman is going on blaming her about Satoshi's disappearance. How could she have done it? Her brother's absence is her biggest pain, imagining that she's the guilty of his vanishing is simply craziness. Ah, now I realize why she has killed Teppei. In her opinion he could have been one of Satoshi's kidnappers. Kidnappers, tsk. As if he would be alive, after having been secluded more than a year ago.

But I thought Mion loved Keiichi, not Satoshi... Satoshi was her sister's desire... But probably she had loved him the whole time too, and she tried to replace him to forget him, or rather she tried to leave Satoshi to her sister Shion, before surrendering to her instinct... I don't understand.

My poor Satoko... this world is going to a very fast and dramatic end. She's going to suffer from punishments of Hell, another time. I... I don't want her to face this giant pain. It's half past five, and she's not here, now, that's a good chance. I quickly go to her bedroom, and I find a little box in her drawer. Inside it, a little syringe containing her usual medicine. I'm exchanging it with another one, full of C120. They are nearly the same, fortunately, she won't notice the difference, even if her mind is so sharp. She has to take her medicine at nine o' clock, during this evening, and she's very strict about it; she had had to be so, otherwise her health conditions would have got worse, another time.

I will go out for a short walk, when that hour arrives. I'm killing her to avoid her a crueler fate, but I can't see her clawing at her throat until she dies, that would be too painful. But after that? … Who cares. Watanagashi will come in three days, they will kill me soon anyway, I fear. Just, I have to hide her corpse somewhere, I'd prefer Mion not to torment a dead girl, at least. So... probably that girl will be furious, since she won't be able to find Satoko anywhere, and maybe she will try to torture me instead of her. Probably she has killed Shion too, and now she's looking for new victims. Maybe I should name her a _demon_ instead of a _girl_, her conscience has already been wiped out for sure. Hinamizawa Syndrome is such a cruel disease... she used playing with us until a few days ago, and now she's considering us as her worst enemies. OK, now I know what to do, after Satoko's death.

What will that demon do, when she realize Satoko and I have vanished too? She still needs a scapegoat, someone to relieve her frustration against. Well, she hasn't many choices... Keiichi and Rena will be her targets, for sure. The former or the latter? Keiichi represents her hopeless love, and it doesn't care whether the one she loves really is Satoshi or Keiichi himself. He's always so trustful, he could be captured easily, somewhat... but Rena is her enemy, I mean, her opponent in this endless love affair. She has been so, and she's going to be so even in our next worlds. I can't even think about it... My friends, I'm sorry, I can't avoid you this painful calyx. You wouldn't accept to inject the drug voluntarily, I've experienced it in another world, when Rena had refused angrily... And I'm too little and weak even to try to kill you, when I had tried to drug Mion I've seen the result of my attempt... I had committed suicide.

I look at the time... It's nearly six o' clock, now. Satoko has still not arrived. I wonder if I've acted in time, or if my little friend has been already grabbed by that demon. Maybe I should have been more resolute, and now it's too late. Poor Satoko. No, wait... why should Mion have looked for her only, ignoring me? In the other worlds she had killed me before her. I have to stay calm, probably she's safe, for now. Shame on me, I can't even go out and search for her, if she comes to home in the meanwhile, and Mion phones her to invite her at the Manor... No, no, mine would be a tragic mistake.

Yes, I'm hearing her approaching home. I'm so relieved. Now I can think about the place I need. I can't bring Satoko's corpse that far, I'm not strong enough. Oh, the Saiguden will work. I have to hide her only for the following two days, after this short period the whole village will begin to show the final symptoms of the disease, and once they are driven to craziness everything will be soon over. And about me, instead? Hmmm... yes, that sort of precipice not far from our road to school will be fine. We could see all the village from there, I remember I had stayed there with Satoko so many times, to admire the panorama... But I also had noticed how deep it is.

No, wait a second, it's not a good idea... I wanted to make sure the demon doesn't violate Satoko's corpse. But why should I protect mine, instead? I want my friends not to suffer, in this world, and if she finds my dead body, maybe Rena and Keiichi's fate will be not so tragic. I'll use a normal kitchen knife, I don't want to think about anything special.

Satoko has entered from the door, finally, and she hails me. She seems tired and a bit still worried, but she's fine. I return her greeting. She asks me what I want for dinner, I answer that I'm not hungry. I suggest her not to eat too, using as excuse an imaginary fattening of her. She eyes me, annoyed, but she decides to follow my advice. I want just to talk with her as with a good friend, as she's always been. I want to spend these last three hours calmly, alone.

Please don't talk to me, Hanyuu, this evening I'm tired, and I need to rest.


	13. Twin stories

**13 – Twin stories**

_Hinamizawa, 15th October 1983_

- - - - - - -#l#- - - - - - -

IRIE INSTITUTE

HEREDITARY DISEASES DEPARTMENT

HINAMIZAWA SYNDROME

REPORT #132

14th October, Year of Showa 58

- - - - - - -#l#- - - - - - -

"I've already said I don't want to read those dossiers!" Rika exclaimed. "They are so long, and boring..."

Like during the previous meeting, it was a late evening. And, like the other time, Rika had to hear what Irie-sensei and Takano were saying.

"I've never said you had to, Rika-chan. They are useful because they remind me everything I want to tell you. But before examining our results, there is another issue I can't absolutely forget..."

"And what is it?"

"This." Irie took a little black box, and he opened it. He looked serious, careful not to spoil its content. Rika eyed him, worried. _What has happened, now? A letter from someone? Maybe the Tokyo organisation is trying to rebuild contacts with the Clinic? And why?_ Irie didn't give her time enough to think about it. He raised the hand, and he showed a white lace band.

"Oh, Rika-chan" he asked with his brightening eyes, while reaching a joyful state of ecstasy, "Do you think that this band match the black maid suit I've bought last week? I don't know if it's too big, but it would bring a touch of style, I am sure of it, so if you wear it I could say immediately if it's …"

Ten seconds later, Irie was medicating his fingers, after that Rika had smashed them with the dossier.

"I'm in my period, so please don't kid me, Irie-sensei." Irie was already aware of that part of her character, so Rika wasn't forced to always smile, or say _Nippa _in each sentence, when she was with him, and finally, after how she had behaved in the previous days, she couldn't fake to be just an innocent little girl. Still, a little girl having menstruation was not the best image she could evoke, but it was vivid enough to break off the subject.

"I... I see, it's better not to exaggerate, then... So let's see what we've discovered in these last days. Do you remember what I've told you in the end of our previous meeting here?"

"Hmmm... I'm sorry, I don't. Can you remind me?" In the final moments of the last meeting she was too nervous, to listen to what he was saying.

"It's not a problem. I've told you I wanted to fill my database of blood samples, in order to find other inhabitants of the village with the ATPC."

"ATPC? What does this acronym stand for, now?"

"Hem, sorry, it's the name of the protein we had found inside Satoshi-kun's blood. We've decided to give it a temporary name, calling it simply protein would have been too generic, and we might confuse it with other similar substances we often talk about with the other doctors, when they are here. This name comes from..."

Rika shook her head, to make Irie-sensei realize she cared only about the other carriers of the ATPC, she wasn't interested in speeches understandable only by other doctors.

"Hm... yes, this is a minor matter, I've written it in the dossier, but we can leave it out... So, if you want to know it... Our result is... Two matches."

"It's not a great achievement. In this moment only two people in the whole Hinamizawa can survive even without my help, this is what you're saying."

"I know it, but this is not unexpected, don't be disappointed because of this. If the protein had been present in a larger number of _blessed _people, if you want to name them so, we would have analyzed it much sooner. Moreover, this means we have someone who can give us samples of it, if necessary."

"You should have found it sooner anyway. Didn't you say you already had a giant database you used during your tests?"

"It's not that easy, Rika-chan. When you look for something, you often don't notice the other things which are around it. Imagine, if you are in an entirely dark room and you want to search for a coin, using a powerful magnet can help you a lot. But the magnet itself doesn't allow you to find your shorts, or your mirror, and so on, because they are not metallic objects. In medicine it always works so: when you look for something, you use a test which can find it, but which ignores a lot of other things. Do you how many exams a full check-up is made of?"

"The ones you've made me in all these years are enough, for me. But so why, in Satoshi-kun's case, have you..."

"...have we found it? Because its concentration was so high that even the basic analysis could observe it. I suppose that such a quantity was due to the previous level of Satoshi-kun's disease, the strength and the high number of parasites made the presence of ATPC increase exponentially. It's the most classic predator-prey system, put a couple of foxes in a wood full of rabbits and you'll see how many of them you'll see after some time."

"You're saying that the parasites were the prey, then, and once there wasn't any of them anymore, there was nothing to "feed" the protein with... That's why, after that he looked fine again, the ATPC nearly had disappeared, then..."

"That's right, Rika! You've got it! By the way, I can say that the two matches I was talking before about carry the ATPC naturally, on the contrary of Satoshi-kun. Its concentration in their blood is too low to hypothesize that they have it as result of a L5."

"OK, I've understood. Now, let's go to the most interesting part. Who are these matches?"

"Look yourself." Irie gave her a couple of sheets of paper, full with data, graphics and a lot of tables. They were similar to a clinical folder... well, probably they were so. And in the top right corner, she could read their names.

She gasped._ Sonozaki Oryou, Sonozaki Mion._ She looked at the doctor, who decided to explain her at once what he knew. But before he could open his mouth, Rika whispered "TIME, STOP!" And time really stopped, everything stayed as it was in that moment, even Irie-sensei and Takano were motionless statues.

To tell the truth, Rika was not able to stop time. That short sentence was not a spell, a sort of _abracadabra_, but only a way to communicate with Hanyuu. She wanted her to do that magic, in order to discuss with her about that revelation. She eyed her ancestor, and she asked: "Hanyuu, could you remind me how many times each of our friends had been gone crazy, in all the previous worlds?"

Hanyuu raised her right hand, and she closed her eyes. A little purple crystal appeared, and then it rolled like a music box, before disappearing after some second. Hanyuu opened her eyes again, and she answered: "In the past 248 worlds, in 63 of them Keiichi-san had been guilty, in 61 it had been Rena-san, in 62 Satoko-chan, in 24 Shion-san and in 38 Mion-san. At least this is what we've concluded during our examinations."

"And now Irie is telling us that Mii-chan can't ever suffer from the disease? So were our calculations wrong?"

"It's hard to say, Rika. Have we been wrong 38 times, in your opinion? It's not impossible, but it would be simpler to claim that maybe he's the one wrong, while we..."

"Hmmm... before saying this, let's think more deeply about it... I had never thought about them really, I considered them as something pointless, but now... Hanyuu, don't you think that those numbers... are anomalous? We know that their problems were present in every single world, but the one who went crazy _was chosen randomly._ There wasn't a real reason if for example, in a specific world, Keiichi's paranoia overwhelmed him, instead of seeing Rena listening to those theories about the alien invasion."

"I don't understand, Rika."

"Neither I. Let's say it in this way: once you decide the protagonist of a story is chosen randomly, it's like throwing a dice, OK? Well, if you roll them a big number of times, the number one, two, three... they all appear globally a similar number of times. At least they normally do so, we've tried it so many times, with Satoko-chan, during the rainy evenings at home..."

Hanyuu opened her eyes wide: "Now I see what you're saying... Why is Mion-san's and Shion-san's number of tragedies so small, compared to the others?"

Rika nodded: "In 250 worlds, nearly, each of them had to be involved 50 times, more or less... While instead..., you can see it. So, what about Mion's 38 cases? Hmmm... it's not that difficult to explain it, if you think carefully about it. Don't we know they often switch their role? They've told us once, during the last Watanagashi. And we know also that their have similar likings... And that... that Mion's and Shion's worlds were quite similar, after all."

Hanyuu froze, and Rika slightly smiled: "The only possible conclusion is that even in the worlds where we thought Mion was guilty... well, in those worlds her sister was the villain, and not her. If you add 24 to 38, you have 62, which is very similar to the other numbers we have."

"So are you saying that _Mion-san has never suffered from the Hinamizawa Syndrome, _thanks to that substance? This is what are you saying, Rika? But so... why only her, and not Shion-san? They are twins, she should carry that protein too, then!"

"I don't know why. Probably the doctor was going to tell us the answer now, but you have blocked him."

"You've told to do that, Hauu! Don't blame me!"

"It's just the same, but if this can make you feel better, that's OK, I've been the one who has blocked him. Well, maybe I should have waited for some moment, before asking you to freeze time. But now I know what I must ask him. Hanyuu, please dispel this enchantment, and let's hear what he wants to tell us."

A moment later, Irie was free to speak again. Anyways, he blocked himself momentarily, hesitating, uneasily as if he had noticed that something strange had happened. But, since he couldn't realized what it was exactly, he thought it was just a suggestion, and he kept on explaining:

"Rika-chan, this result can be unexpected, but it's not incompatible with our whole knowledge of the Syndrome. Moreover, the fact that Mion-san is one of the carriers of the ATPC allows us to explain what really had happened in the basement."

"So could you explain it to me, please?"

"Yes, sure. When I was told about it, I asked for all the possible details, and they said to me that Mion-san's arm had been bitten by Satoshi-kun, and that some of her blood went on his eyes."

"I didn't know it. I wasn't told about it, they explained to me only the most important facts."

"Rika-chan" said Takano "Human eyes are peculiar organs, full of open blood vessel. Namely, we're pretty sure that Mion-san's blood came into contact with Satoshi-kun's one, and the ATPC entered into his circulation. Blood inside human body is very fast, and it can reach in a very little time each limb of the individual, including the nervous cells. So, while the others were looking for him, that sort of antidote worked inside him, and it healed him. This kind of process can happen also in case of other bacteria, or other diseases generally, for example Hepatitis C. If, for any reason, a sample of infected blood reach the doctor's eyes, the latter can seriously contract the same disease, no matter how many cautions he had taken before. This is what happened to your friend, but in this case we are talking about a helpful protein, he was lucky."

"And in only twenty-thirty minutes has he got fine again?"

"Not completely fine, but yes, it's true. Less than half an hour is a short time for an antidote, indeed, but other substances work even more quickly. Some poison can kill you in one or two seconds, if you ingest it."

"So Mii-chan has unwillingly helped Satoshi-kun to heal? It's so... so ironical. You had been looking for a cure for so much time, and it would have been enough to observe more deeply your own patient, and the ones just around him."

Irie wasn't someone who usually got angry because of Rika's satire, and even this time he started laughing: "AH-HA HA HA! You're really right! But it's not the first time that a complex problem is solved by an elementary solution... Let's see, for example... Do you know about pasteurization? So many diseases and problems brought by infected milk were solved by simply warming it..."

"Yes... but... can I ask you for something else?"

"Hmmm... do you want to know why Mion-san carries the ATPC and Shion-san doesn't, am I right? It's really normal to think about this, I understand."

Rika nodded. For her, this was a very important question. If Shion had been protected by the Plague, all those disasters, all that pain... could have been avoided. Their road towards a happy world would have been much shorter.

"I can't be sure of it, Rika-chan, unfortunately. It would take quite a lot of time to discover the origins of the ATPC, and I don't deny that I'd like to study them, after having definitely defeated the Syndrome, of course. But we can think about some hypothesis. We can discard the hereditary factor, since Shion-san, as nearly the whole Sonozaki Family doesn't carry it. So... some past experience who make her develop it, as vaccine? Possible, but not probable. I can't think about an event which involve only two people in Hinamizawa."

"What about something about the rites of their family?" proposed Takano "Oryou-sama has been their ruler until some day ago, and now Mion-san has taken her place... Maybe some drug they swallow. Who knows, if she hadn't been disinherited, also Sonozaki Akane-san would have been protected by the Syndrome. After all, surely in the past the Sonozakis, as vassals, had sometimes to leave Hinamizawa, to pay homage to their lord. Without the Queen Carrier's help there would have been quite a high chance to die, if they hadn't some hidden resource. Even if... if you think... this village claimed to be descendant from the Demons, and now we discover that the chief of the family who more embody this principle can't really become like a demon... this is... really ironical. A joke by Fate... A joke by Fate... A joke by Fate..." Until some month before, this kind of speech would have made her terribly excited... Now she might be still interested in it, but she didn't show that feeling at all, she was repeating those last words, as if she was just a tape recorder, without caring about what she was saying. Well, maybe it was not a full shame, Rika thought, being keen on these matters had been one of the reasons which had brought her to that state of hollow.

"What Takano-san has said is possible too, but... I really can't imagine such a powerful rite. This protein is quite surely produced inside Mion-san's bone narrow. However, I'm going to ask her about her family's stories and tales about this kind of traditions, maybe we'll be lucky."

"But so... two of the Three Great Families have some substance who fight the disease, inside them... Maybe that's why they have become the Three Great Families, indeed... What about the Kimiyoshis? Have you found something special?"

"I don't, sorry, Rika-chan. In order to find something unusual, I need to know what I have to find, just like in the case of the ATPC."

Rika was puzzled, but she had still something to ask: "Earlier, you told me that the protein was produced by Mii-chan's body... So... are you saying that the ATPC inside her blood will never disappear?"

"I think so.. Of course, I can't be sure of it, I told you mines are still conjectures, but I am going to make some test in the next days. I'm going to check the concentration of the protein, and to use it for develop a final cure for the whole village. Don't worry, this whole story is making me trustful about our future researches. Ah, by the way, could you help Shion-san, please? She's arranging Satoshi-kun's case in the basement, he's going home tonight. I've told Satoko-chan she had to wait some other day, but I had lied, I just wanted to make her a surprise. It's a real pity, I won't be able to see her face, when she sees him..."

…

The following morning, at school, in the teacher's office, Chie-sensei was explaining to Alice her exercises for the whole day. Since she was the only teacher of the school, she couldn't take care of everyone at the same time, so she had to delegate some of her students, or, like in this case, giving the work before the start of the lesson.

As for Alice, she was listening her words diligently and she claimed in the end to have understood everything. She was alone that day, her brother had been required in Krinoto without any warning, because of job issues, and so she was destined to stay far from all her classmates, and during all the time. But She stood up, but Chie-sensei asked her about a doubt she had:

"Alice-san... There is something I had been wondering for some week. You seem to speak a pretty good Japanese, but I don't understand why both of you talk to each other using the appellations _Nee-chan_ and _Nii-chan. _These titles are used towards only an older brother, and an older sister, so one of you doesn't use it properly. Which of you is the older twin?" Chie-sensei was not present, when Alice had told it during their first day of school. The Italian girl looked at her, then she smiled.

"Well... I think that _Nii-chan_ is a so nice word, it sounds so sweetly, so I like to use as endearment. However, we are aware of the meaning of those words, and none of us is wrong. I've been the one who first came out of our mother's womb... but at the same time he is the older brother."

"What... do you mean?"

"It's a strange story... and today's lesson is going to start just in ten minutes. I've time to tell you, if you are interested."

Chie nodded, then Alice went on speaking: "We're born in February 1965, a very cold period there. When my mother started being in labor, Dad decided to drive her into the hospital. It was not that far from our house, but they had to go down from the mountain to reach it, using their car. Midnight had already passed, and it was a clear but very cold night. But halfway, after a hairpin bend, they ran into a little unexpected snowslide, which had partially blocked the way. Dad made the mistake of turning the engine off, to get out of the car and check if they could go on somewhat. Once he had understood they could continue, he realized the engine didn't turn on anymore, probably because of the frost. And in that point, after that turn, there was no slope, it was impossible to go down with the engine off."

"Even today, that is a secondary road, and in the night there are no cars traveling, there. It's used only to go to work, or to go to the bigger cities, to do shopping. Then, being blocked there could become a tragedy, and Dad tried to turn on the engine again, uselessly. After four or five attempts he had to give up, he would have only discharged the car battery without obtaining anything. So he gave his coat to Mom, and he hugged her to make her suffer less from the low temperature. They could nothing but staying in their car and keeping the windows up, going on foot to home or to the hospital was pure madness. But even so, when the first car passed in the morning, and they could reach the hospital, more than six hours had passed in that cold car, and she had already struck by hypothermia."

Alice lowered her glance, gloomy. "Her health conditions immediately appeared desperate. She nearly couldn't breath, her heartbeat was irregular, and she still had to give birth to both of us. And in fact, after some time, I went out of her womb, but I weren't moving, or crying. The doctors visited me quickly, and since there was no heartbeat nor breath, they thought I had been already dead. But they couldn't waste any time with me, there was another baby who had to come, and my mother needed full assistance."

"After a quarter of an hour Nii-chan had been born. Fortunately he was still alive, no one doubted about it, he was crying incredibly loudly, they've told me. He was put by me, and after that they started checking Mom's conditions, which were getting worse. She wasn't breathing at all, in that moment, and even her heart was getting weaker and weaker. She was going to die."

"Nii-chan, instead, was keeping on crying, louder and louder. Attracted by his voice, even people from the adjacent rooms had begun to give a look inside, to see what was happening, until one of the medics, getting impatient, exclaimed something similar to _"Please, take that baby away from here!"_. He simply didn't stop. The nurse tried to take him, but in the meanwhile our arms had got stuck in each others, somewhat, maybe because he was going on flailing. It was like he didn't want to accept what was happening to her sister and her mother, and he didn't want to leave me. And just a moment before we were separated, as if he had been able to wake me up, I started crying, too."

"I don't know what had happened, neither the doctors didn't completely understand it. They imagined mine was only a state of shock caused by the hypothermia we had had to deal with, maybe they were right, who knows. However, with her two babies crying, even Mom's heartbeat answered, getting more regular, and in some hour she was awake again. Dad had been present during the whole time, and in the end he started crying, like a man come out of a nightmare. And then he decided to change the names he wanted to give us, to remember this strange miracle."

"What do you mean?"

"We had to be called Giorgia and Francesco, but that day he thought that other names would have suited us better. Alice, in fact, is a reminder of Lewis Carroll's character, who goes to Wonderland, the Other World, and is able to come back, awakening from her dream; Giorgia is just my second name, now. Giancarlo, instead, is a composite name: _Giovanni_ comes from the Hebraic, and it shows the divine element, meant as _present_; _Carlo_ comes from the German, and it reminds the human element, since it means _free man._ Namely, in his opinion he had been the point of contact between God and man, Heaven and Earth, which made that incredible event possible."

"Hmmm, he did choose your names carefully."

"Oh, sure! After all he felt blessed that day, he thought that if his wife and his sons had died it would have been his fault, because they hadn't stayed at home despite that really cold night."

"Indeed, it had been an incredibly high risk..."

"Dad, like our Grandpa too, is not good at taking decisions, they can't stand the stress. That's why, after he goes back to Italy, Nii-chan will probably have to take directly control of the little cotton mill of our family. At the moment an uncle of us is managing it, but this shift has already been planned."

"Isn't he too young?"

"We can't do otherwise. In the last twelve years, our uncle had managed it fairly successfully, but he has to retire, he is simply getting too old, and Giancarlo is the only one able to replace him, in our family. You wouldn't say it at a first glance, but he's a sort of Pole Star for all of us, he's so wise and attentive with who he really cares, even if he looks like a curmudgeon, initially. We could say that he's our Sonozaki Mion-san, even if such a role doesn't exist any more, in our birthplace. You can't imagine how many phone calls we have in the evenings from Italy..."

If her brother had been there he would have said she was exaggerating. Alice loved to do it, she had learned it from her grandfather. She was used to see only the virtues of the people around her, especially when she talked about her brother, even if that meant exaggerating with her praises. She liked to speak highly of him, because she wanted him to be a great person. In fact, she feared she wouldn't have been so, she feared to be worse than him. All of a sudden, the girl smiled, sadly, and then she said softly "This is his destiny... and his curse. _Probably he would have been happier if I had never born._"

"What have you said, Alice-san? I didn't understand your last words."

"Oh... no, sensei." The halo of bitterness vanished "Nothing special. Well, we should go, now, it's quite late!"

She hoped that nobody had heard her saying this, but she was wrong. She didn't know that, behind the door, Rena was there, and she had heard every single word.


	14. Hinamizawa's daily routine

**14 – Hinamizawa's daily routine**

_Hinamizawa, 18th October 1983_

"So? Which of us should take this?"

Keiichi was holding the bat he had kept in his closet in the last months. But, even if he had used it more than once, the name written on it clearly showed it didn't belong to him. On its knob, he could clearly read _Houjou Satoshi_. And now, in the school corridor, the boy called Houjou Satoshi was in front of him, smiling and quiet.

"Tsk, the bad habit of borrowing the others' things without asking. Now we can see the results, Keiichi-san."

"Oh, Rena thinks that you should give it back to Satoshi-kun. It is his old bat..."

"I'm not saying I want to keep something belonging to him, Rena. The fact is that I've often used it, and I've consumed it. I should buy a new bat and give it to him to pay back the favor he has made me."

"I-I didn't make any favor to you, you don't have to repay me at all... That bat was already old and worn out when I left it here..."

"Ara ara, Nii-Nii. Keiichi-san is offering you a new bat, do you really want to refuse his noble gesture?"

"Oh, and now why have you a so high consideration of me, Satoko?"

"Just because we'd save our money in this way. And so we could invest it to buy those new pulleys I've seen in that hardware shop in Okinomiya. The ones I have at home are terribly rusty, and a refined lady like me can't use that kind of equipment in her traps."

"Ah, so this is what you were really thinking!"

"Oh, now aren't you thinking to change your mind, Keiichi-san?" Satoko take a little remote control from her pocket, and she menacingly moved her finger next to it.

"Satoko, please stop. You shouldn't be that rude, if you want someone to do something you're asking for."

"But Nii-Nii..."

Keiichi's eyes brightened "Oh, Satoshi is so kind! Thank you very much, where were you when Satoko was bullying me?"

"It's not true! Don't tell Nii-Nii such lies!"

"It's all OK, Satoko, I know you are a good sister. And you, Keiichi-san, I haven't thanked you yet for what you did for Satoko. You, and all the others, I don't want to forget anyone."

"You're welcome... but please, call me _Kei-chan_, or _Keiichi-kun_... That _-san_ is making me nervous..."

All of them laughed. Not far from there, Alice, Mion and Shion were looking at the scene. Rena had noticed them, and she joined the three girls.

"It seems that Kei-chan and Satoshi-kun get on well... I wasn't that sure about it, they have opposite characters, more or less."

"Ah, Shion. This old lady was sure their team spirit would have triumphed over their differences! Don't you know that in a friend you look for what you haven't?"

"I'd rather say it's usually the opposite, Onee... Basically you search for someone with your same interests and hobbies."

"So, explain to me what is happening over there."

"Aren't they keen on baseball, both of them? They were discussing about that old seedy bat, before."

"It's not enough, Shion! Most of Japaneses loves it, and still we can see how many homicides and crimes happen, you can read it on every newspaper you can find all over the country!"

"You're watching too many gangster movies, Onee... However... well, for sure my presence is the decisive factor, my light soul and my splendid courtesy are the elements who make the shadows disappear. If we relied only on your manners we'd have seen the World War III right here."

"Shion! You, stupid sister!"

"Oh, isn't it true?" Shion looked elsewhere, smiling ironically, while her sister would have liked to smash her face with the bat the others were talking about.

"Oh, if you're so confident why don't we see if you're right, Shion..." Mion's phalanxes popped, getting ready to that ultimate fight.

"However, they really look like enjoying these moments together. I wonder if they could... get engaged soon..."

"Ehhhhh?" Rena, Shion and Mion turned quickly her eyes at who made that unexpected and unwelcome comment.

"Why not?" Alice went on "We are not in dark times any more, when homosexual love was forbidden and punished severely. If they fall in love with each other, and they want to live together for the rest of their life, why not? They have complementary behaviors, Kei-chan could go to work, and Satoshi-kun would wait for him, and be a perfect housewife, or househusband, you can decide the right term. Watching TV together, spending nice moments... they could become a nice fam... ehm."

Alice had stopped, terrified. The three Red Eyed Demons behind her didn't clearly agree with her.

…

"You're not good in teasing the others, are you?" Giancarlo was finishing medicating Alice's black eye.

"It was just a little joke! I knew they love them, and I wanted to make them angry, but not so much! I didn't imagine their fear to lose them was that great, they should be less touchy!"

"Next time you should avoid this kind of tricks, then..."

"_Next time _you should help your sister when she's surrounded by a crowd of wild lunatics like them, Nii-chan!" she heartily shook her arms, to show her disappointment "And moreover I know that you had thought the same thing I did."

"I am not saying anything about it until I'm sure they are at least twenty kilometers far from me..." Alice looked at him, annoyed. That answer did mean that he thought so, too, but he wouldn't have admitted it explicitly either under torture. _Chicken hearted Nii-chan..._

Not far from them, even the Sonozaki twins were talking to each other, and they were discussing about love, once again.

"Onee, probably Satoshi-kun will be never an opponent for you, but you should hurry, soon you'll have to go to University, and then it will be too late. Once you leave, Kei-chan and Rena-chan will have a whole year to deepen their reciprocal acquaintance, alone, here in Hinamizawa..."

Mion blushed roughly: "And so? What should I do now?"

"What about inviting Kei-chan at home, and showing yourself while wearing only some sexy underwear, like the one I gave you last month?"

"You are joking! I can't do it!" Mion was shouting now, so everyone turned towards her. She blushed even more, embarrassed, and she didn't dare adding anything else.

"Why not, Onee?" Of course, neither Shion would have ever worn those seductive undies, but this was just a pointless detail, teasing her sister was just too funny; she didn't care about the fact she was talking to the new ruler of the family, and Mion hadn't seemed changed in those moments, even after that acknowledgment. Still, she really wanted to help her to realize her love dream.

"Joking apart, we need some serious strategy, to conquer his heart. What could we do...?"

"Hey, don't meddle in it, Shion! This is a problem of mine!"

"And since this is a problem of yours, it's my duty to help you. If I wait for you, I'll die of old age before seeing you two together... Hmmm..." Mion lowered her eyes, what Shion had said was not pleasant, but she had got a point, and she didn't answer.

"Rena wants to make a proposal, can Rena say what she has in her mind?" Once again, the brown-haired girl had heard everything, and her coming had made both of them astonished.

"Rena, please..." exclaimed Shion, annoyed "Don't materialize yourself in this way, each blessed time, you'll cause me a heartbreak one day or another... Anyway, what's your suggestion?"

"Very well, Shii-chan... Each of us will spend a Sunday alone with Kei-chan. _Alone. _On 23rd of this month he'll stay with Mii-chan, wherever she wants, and seven days later he will be with me. For him, it will be just like having a date with both of us. And after the second date, Kei-chan will say with who he has spent the most pleasant day, and he'll declare the winner!"

"Oh... it seems a very good idea... but why don't we exchange the dates? We're going to let you the next Sunday, and we're going to take him later."

"Rena doesn't agree..." The two girls were even ready to quarrel, to decide who had to be the first, but they didn't want to do it just for fun, there was a good motive. Having the second Sunday at disposal would have meant having more time to prepare the date, and it would have been a great advantage, since the first one was just in five days.

"You are not supposed to agree. You made the proposal, we decide the rules, now..."

"Rena could refuse, then..."

"Well, if you need more time, what about delay everything to 7th and 14th November? We could decide who will have Kei-chan in these two dates by tossing a coin..."

Shion reflected about it, and then she showed to like the idea. "Yes, it sounds the most reasonable option... HEY! Why are you here, now? This shouldn't matter to you!"

Alice, the one who said the last suggestion, was excitedly laughing and ignoring Shion's complaint. Rena, then, smiled sinisterly.

"What's the problem, Shii-chan? Don't tell me you'd have left alone Mii-chan, I wouldn't trust you if you said so. Moreover your family is cruel and powerful, and you could use unfair means to win this war. So, since I knew you would have helped your sister, I preferred to watch over myself, and I thought I'd better look for an ally..." While hearing this, Alice smiled resolutely and greeted Rena, like what a good soldier would do towards his commander.

"That black eye wasn't enough for you, then!" No, it wasn't enough. Alice had recovered quickly her energy and enthusiasm, as usual. After noticing her menaces were useless, Shion stood up, with Rena's same malicious smile. Sparks and thunders were coming from each of the two girls' eyes, as a sign of mortal defiance, and the green-haired girl exclaimed provocatively: "Very well... let's see who will win! Now, lesson is over, let's start our arrangements at once!"

Rena, Alice and Shion ran quickly away, resolute. Mion, instead, stayed sat on her chair, disconsolate: "Why do they care my private life so much?" she whimpered.

…

"Whoa, the Angel Mort is all for us! That will be great!" Keiichi couldn't believe to what he could see. He was the only customer of the haunt, as the Sonozaki family had booked all the tables for a couple of hours, in order to let them stay alone for some time. Mion, in the meanwhile, was looking at Shion. Both of them were wearing the usual uniforms of the restaurant, like the other servers around them, but the pony-tailed girl was feeling greatly uneasily.

"Shion, you shouldn't have used our money to make this kind of reservations. If you were the chief of our family we'd all go bankrupt before the end of the year..."

"Oh, come on, Onee, it hasn't been that expensive, we're not in summer anymore, so it's not high season, and our dear Uncle made me a special price. Moreover, you can see how our Kei-chan is happy, even if before today you were going on saying it was a banal and stupid idea."

"Hmpf, I still think so, when you have to bring someone somewhere you always take him here. And now we'll all get a flu, thanks to you." Shion smiled ironically, pointing out to her the heating system, already turned on. It was not a wintry day yet, but making the customers feel slightly hot usually increased their requests of ice cream and cold desserts, finally. In the meanwhile, behind the window, two unexpected spectators were spying them.

"Oh, Rena was sure Shii-chan would have used the strength of her family, what can we do, Ali-chan, what can we do?" Full of jealousy, her face was like jam spread on the glass.

"I don't know, but you should hide better, or they'll find us... entering in the hall could be considered unfair, the rules we set forbid us to be seen by Kei-chan today, and we could even get a penalty in this game... Still, we are not cut out of this. I mean, we probably should just wait, if I have not been confused by what I saw around us during all the various stagings, we won't be alone during these two weeks."

"Rena agrees." she said while nodding. Yes, in the period before the challenge _nearly_ everyone was excited... Keiichi hadn't either a suspicion about what was happening behind him "So what should we do? Take advantage of a future situation? Hmmm... We should keep Keiichi-kun far from them, or giving him ugly memories... But Rena doesn't want to make something bad to him, Rena just wants to bring him hooooooome!"

Alice smiled, a bit scared by what her friend had just told her, but their conversation was interrupted by a jingle coming from the inside. Two of the waitresses were carrying a giant four layered cake: short pastry, chocolate, fruit salad and cream. It would have been enough to feed a whole army, but behind them, just in case, there was another giant cake, high and completely white, similar to a wedding one. Keiichi dribbled because of the ecstasy, he was ready to eat all those sorts of good things, even if it wasn't the most healthy lunch he had had. Shion, instead, had seen something she didn't expect. She asked her sister:

"But it was you who made the second cake? I don't remember to have done or ordered it."

"Are you talking to me, Shion? No, no, I haven't prepared or asked for any sweet today, you had told me to let you arrange everything..."

"But then who..."

Shion's fright was well founded. The wedding cake started trembling, more and more. Was it a bomb? No... even if it exploded. Inside, once the cream had completely fallen to the floor, an unwanted guest appeared, wearing a bridal gown.

"Oh, Keiichi-san, you're so mean, why in this contest only two competitors are allowed? And two old decrepit spinsters, to make things worse. What a poor remark you have about me, and after what I've done for you in these months, I've ever cooked your meals, washed your dished... And still aren't you considering me?" That little blond girl laughed scornfully, proud of her succesful joke.

Shion was furious: "SATOKO! What do you dare saying? When Satoshi-kun knows it, you'll be spanked the whole day! And if he doesn't, I will do it personally! This time you've really committed something you couldn't afford to do! But, if you are here..." She looked below, under the upper shelf of the food trolley the wedding cake was on, and she saw a blue-colored head: _Nippa~_. "Rika-chan, you too! But where have you taken that dress from... ah, Irie-sensei, sure, when I grab him... Confess it, it was Rena who has sent you here, am I right?"

"Oh, you're even meaner than Keiichi-san, when you say such affronts. As I've just said, I'm a young lady too, and I claim my right to take part to this activity."

"This is NOT a club activity, this is a serious matter! Kei-chan, if you are able to catch her, you'll have a platinum ticket who allows you to eat here for free, lifetime!"

"_Lifetime?"_ Keiichi's eyes illuminated with immensity, and he stood up to realize his benefactor's desire. But Satoko was ready. Under her dress, she had hidden a lot of devices which would have been very useful. She opened her hands and bended her knees, ready to fight like a gunslinger.

"We should go." said Alice "It's something we've already seen before, and I think to know how it ends. Kei-chan will be lucky if tomorrow he's already out of the hospital. After all, that's why we have suggested them to delay the challenge... The other twins wouldn't have cared to have the first date, thinking to have time enough to prepare it as well as possible... But in this way, we have studied them, and we have precious info now." That sort of puppet theatre they had prepared and realized at school some week before had worked well, Shion and Mion had thought it was a sudden proposal that day, and they had now a considerable advantage.

…

"Where are they, now?" Seven days later Shion was even angrier. The whole thing wasn't working as she had planned, and the challenge with Rena was going to the wrong direction. She was looking for Keiichi and the other team of girls, but she couldn't find them. They were not at the pit, nor at the mahjong club or at school, where Shion and Mion were now. And even fate was against them, that day it was a sunny one, strangely hot for that period: an ideal afternoon to go out and amuse yourself in the open air. It was already three PM, and after the disaster happened in their first date, a pleasant day for Keiichi would have been Mion's condemn.

"Shion..." her sister tried to calm her down. "We should go to home, now. I have... I have other issues to take care of, you should now. Let's forget this story..." she looked depressed, and Shion couldn't accept it.

"Onee, are you saying you're renouncing to your love dream? No, I can't allow you to do so, I could never forgive myself! Have you forgotten the stake we are playing for?"

"Well, Rena-chan has been absolutely slier than us, she must have known about us and she learned from our past mistakes. So she had arranged everything to be sure that neither Satoko-chan nor us knew where they had gone, so she has..."

_Why are you so sad today, Onee? _Shion knew about her sister shyness, but that afternoon she was even more melancholy than usual. Was she still thinking that Keiichi would have preferred a more polite and womanish girl than her? Or did she felt more responsible after having become such an important figure in the family, and in the village too? Did this forbid her to be light-hearted, now? No, it couldn't end that way. She grabbed her sister by the hand, and she reached a public telephone next to the school, fortunately there was still one of them for emergency calls, because of the past availment of that building. She dealt a number, and she waited.

"Hi, this is Giancarlo Serco-san. Can I ask who is calling, please?"

"Please not be that formal, Gi-chan! It's just Shion, not the Master of the Universe! I have no time to waste, we need your help immediately."

"About that absurd challenge? I've already said I want to stay out of it."

"JUST ANSWER TO MY QUESTION! If your sister had planned to hide somewhere Kei-chan and Rena-chan, which place do you think she'd have chosen?"

Shion clearly heard a sigh, and she reacted raising her eyes exasperated. Then: "Maybe it was Rena-chan who made that choice, not Alice... However, if I were you I'd consider places I usually don't think about, those girls know you deeply. Which is the last place you'd look for them?"

The green haired girl reasoned about it, and then: "Oh, my God... Our Manor... And the most suitable place for them would be... Don't tell me they managed to reach its roof, somehow! Yes, Rena-chan could even enter in our house, and bring Kei-chan too, Mom has no reason to let her out, she doesn't know anything about this challenge..." She heard a tone of satisfaction coming from the receiver, and then the busy signal. He had hang up. "The usual solitary bear, that guy really hates being friendly, at least once in his life... Well, at least he has been useful. Let's go, Onee."

Fortunately Kasai was waiting for them with his car, so they arrived at the Manor after a few minutes. They found the main door opened. "Ah-ha, so they are really here!". Shion's statement was confirmed, some second later, by the fact that the root of their house was nearly destroyed. Over it, a possessed Rena was holding her favorite toy, a heavy and oversized nata, trying to hit Satoko, who was running away giggling.

"Oh, Satoko-chan, once I get you I'll stuff you, you'll be so nice that I'll bring you hoooommmme!" She didn't look pleased to see her date ruined, too, her evil smile clearly claimed for revenge.

"Ho ho ho, you should catch me, before saying that..." Satoko had a rope in her hands, and she was using it to create quick traps against her, fitting it with some nails she had previously prepared on the root, and trying to make Rena stumble with those obstacles.

"I fear they are going to play for a long time... I didn't think that little girl was so astute." said Alice, who was looking at them from the lower ground, crestfallen. Shion joined her, smiling satisfied, and asked how Satoko was able to find them so quickly.

"Ehm... well, we thought to have forecast everything, but we had forgot that Satoko-chan and Rika-chan had kept watch over you too, in the last weeks." She showed her a bugging device. "Satoko-chan had placed some of these in your whole Manor, don't ask me when. Once she heard we were here..." She was stopped. A strong noise coming from the root, caused by one of Rena's powerful hits, which had just been on the verge of Satoko. Both of them went on laughing scornfully, excited by that endless fight, while Alice added "They don't have all their marbles, this little is certain... Another hole in the root, how much will it ever cost, now?"

"Oh, don't worry about it, Ali-chan, our house insurance will pay for all of this. I was more afraid of Batcha's reaction, frankly."

"Are you talking about your grandmother? Oh, she just gave a look at them, and she recommended them not to make too much noise, before going back inside. I am not sure of that, but she looked smiling, to me, she didn't mind to see her house crushed like that..."

"These are news." Shion didn't expect Oryou had become such a quiet old woman. She was not carrying the weigh of the responsibility anymore, she had left that role to Mion, and so perhaps she didn't feel the need to be so cruel and scary. Moreover, the joyful environment usually created by Keiichi was something she had always liked. But it was stiil a bit senseless... Her grandmother got a bit strange, sometimes. "By the way... Kei-chan?"

"Do you want to know where is he...? Well, can you see that giant gash over there, always in the root? Then, you should be able to understand what's happened. Your mother and Rika-chan are healing him, now. Ah, obviously we informed Akane-san about our dare, too." Therefore, Mion proposed to see how he was.

"I'd say we can do more than this." answered Shion "Rena-chan, Satoko-chan, go down from that place, let's hear what Kei-chan's judgement will be." They obeyed, and they reached the room where the boy was.

He was in the dojo, quite surely the best place for such a fundamental choice. Everybody sat down, silently, and Rika then began to speak: "Keiichi-kun, so... have you preferred the Sunday with Mii-chan or the one with Rena-chan?" Certainly he hadn't spent any of the weekends really alone with one of them, but the question had still a sense, and Keiichi closed his eyes, thinking about an answer.

All of them looked at him, wordless. Mion swallowed, popeyed, fearing a negative response; her sister was going on looking at her and immediately after at Keiichi, anxious. Rena was keeping her hands on her face, while shaking continuously her head, not to think at the importance of the moment; Alice wished with all her might that her contribution had been decisive. Satoko was thinking what would have been occurred if that villain had appreciated her enough to choose her instead of those old spinsters, and the thing was making her embarrassed. Rika and Akane, finally, were looking at the whole scene, the former greatly amused by what was happening, the latter more thoughtful and serious.

Now, more than a minute had passed, everyone couldn't stand waiting more. They were eying each other now, their pupils flashing like pushed beasts, they started holding their breath, leaning forward her chest because of the stress of the moment. _What if he chooses her, and not me? Where might I have been mistaken? Could it be possible that... _All of her minds were full of thought and fears like these, and their eyes were wide open, but finally... yes, he had opened them too, he's ready to speak... They were frozen, completely motionless, but now it was time to know the tr-

"I haven't understood why I have to choose."

… They didn't say a word for an eternity, astonished. A cold wind had entered in the dojo, and their hearts all broke synchronously. Then he added:

"After all I had a great time on both these Sundays, we should do it again. Once with Mion and Shion, once with Rena and Alice, and why not, once with Rika and Satoko. But we should invite also the others, we can't let them alone."

"So..." asked Rena looking on the ground and shaking her hands "you don't know about the real meaning of this challenge?"

"Real meaning? What are you talking about..." That was all. Akane stood up and went out of the dojo, looking for the further bands and the pomades she was going to use in a few time.

…

That evening, Mion went to bed early. She was tired, and quite disappointed. Keiichi's attitude towards her started to seem clear, he didn't show a particular interest on her as possible girlfriend, but only as good friend. She started thinking about a possible sad truth "Kei-chan's a marvelous person, and I love him... but he doesn't love me. Probably he loves Rena, and there is no hope for me."

That evening, Rena went to bed early. She was tired, and quite disappointed. Keiichi's attitude towards her started to seem clear, he didn't show a particular interest on her as possible girlfriend, but only as good friend. She started thinking about a possible sad truth "Keiichi-kun is a marvelous person, and I love him... but he doesn't love me. Probably he loves Mion, and there is no hope for me."


	15. Waking from a sweet dream

**15 – Waking from a sweet dream**

_Hinamizawa, 30th November 1983_

The night which was on the verge of beginning was a extraordinarily dark one. A new moon would have come again in four days, and clouds prevented the weak lunar light from reaching the earth. By now, it was too cold to allow the cicadas to cry, probably Hinamizawa would have soon run into the first snow of the season. Therefore, most of the inhabitants of the village had already gone to bed, the following day they would have had to get up early, as usual. But someone was still awake. In a big heated room, the chief of the Kimiyoshi family had just seen something which would have not allowed him to rest, that night.

"This... that expert is kidding us..."

Kimiyoshi was reading the ending page of the study they had decided to ask for nearly two months before, during one of the last city councils. That sheet of paper contained the expert's conclusions, which had been written after his research. The last three lines sounded like a curse:

_The hydrogeologic risk caused by the old excavation for the building of the Dam, by the composition of subsoil and by other contingent factor has been increased in the last period, until reaching the alarm level, after having been undermeasured in the last years. There is statistic evidence to say that a giant landslide will cause the destruction of Hinamizawa in the next six to eight months._

Six to eight months... It meant that Hinamizawa could hardly survive the next Watanagashi. Kimiyoshi turned her eyes away from that document, and looked petrified at Mion, who nodded seriously. That report was the reason of the emergency council she had required urgently.

"I thought it was fair to inform all of you about this harsh situation." She declared, coldly. He, and the other members of the council, couldn't find the right words to use, but they clearly wanted to ask how could that nightmare be possible. "I've already phoned the author of this research some day ago" she went on "He named the most dangerous zones, the mountains most subject to landslides, you can see them here" she took a giant map of the zone, marked with different colors, and she placed in the center of the hall, to make everyone see it, and while going back to her seat she added: "He explained to me that a dry summer followed by a heavy rainstorm might definitely crumble them."

"Crumble?" said Kimiyoshi while analyzing the map, swallowing. The red zones were the ones with high risk, and more than half of the mountains around Hinamizawa were marked with that color. Most of them belonged to the Sonozaki family, but they were zones covered by woods, never really used by them. No wonder if something was happening there without being noticed by anybody.

"Yes, this is what I've said. The soil over there have become more and more sandy during the last years, he told me, because of different reasons, like desertification of the zone and global warming, but also local needs of water for our rice farming, which made the zone around us dryer. You should know that in the last years we've drilled a lot of wells, to achieve all the necessary supplying."

"I understand, but they were necessary works... Moreover, I've not seen woods disappearing lately, and there haven't ever been problems about watering our rice fields in the countryside. If there was no more water, we wouldn't see it covering them like what they are doing even now..."

"Ahh... You're right, but he told about the lowest layers of the soil, and about the water-bearing stratum, which has been damaged by our takings, much bigger than the supplying brought by rain. I'm sorry I can't talk rigorously about this matter, I don't know much about the subject, and the study itself is too complicated for me. You can have a copy of it, if you want." She showed a sort of heavy book, having more than 400 pages. Only reading it would have taken a lot of days, because of all the hard and technical terms surely present inside.

"But even so, thanks to usual rains, we should have..."

"A single violent storm after a hot month without rain would be enough to cause this painful disaster. By the way, last summer we seem to have been lucky, there has been some steady light downpour during the whole summer. But we can't risk next year, too, we're responsible for the villager's safety."

"But can't we do anything? Like placing some safety net, or... building a sort of dam." The others started and looked at him, and Kimiyoshi himself had got shocked by hearing himself talking about realizing something similar to what he had fought against.

"Kimiyoshi-san, I don't think that nets could stop a whole mountain. And building a dam big enough to stop this catastrophe would take too much time, you should know it well."

Nobody answered, they didn't know what to do, or to say. And Rika couldn't do anything but looking at the scene, silent as well. She was aware of their feelings. This was a fatal catastrophe they couldn't avoid, unlike the Dam war. They were desperately searching for a possible countermeasure. But in that moment one of the eldest members of the council broke that silence and shouted:

"It's not possible! I can't believe it! Oyashiro-sama would have not allowed such a disaster, he's protecting us! That study is a fake, there must be a mistake!" Everyone eyed him, and thought that he had got a point. How can the Monk betray them that way? They started discussing aloud, and it was hard for Mion to restore order in the hall. After having done it, she said:

"Garuno-san, I can understand that you're angry and worried, I am so too. But how can you swear we are not in danger, taking responsibility for all the people living in Hinamizawa, two thousands souls?" He didn't rebut, so she continued. "I've already made this work be checked by another studio, and they confirmed it, otherwise I wouldn't have scared you without a reason. Look yourself." She took another sheet, and he gave it to Garuno. A very short and understandable answer, as what she had asked for. Unfortunately, what was written on it was just what Mion had already announced.

_This is a long and detailed research, even too complicated in some point of it. However, its calculations are correct and rigorous, hard to criticize._

Garuno, disquiet, gave then the document back to Mion, saying: "So it's true... but then Oyashiro-sama is hating us... this is a sign of His rage, and this is His revenge!"

"No, it's not true. Oyashiro-sama is not angry with us." Rika replied. As only alive member of the Furude family, she was present at the council too, sat by Mion and Kimiyoshi. Serious and formal, she was showing a much older age than the one her body represented, and her figure inspired some respect. But, in spite of this, Garuno had not been convinced yet:

"Rika-chama, I'm sorry if I sound rude and impolite, but I remember what your father did, during the Dam War. He claimed to be more moderate, he even protected who supported that shameful project! And now you're saying we should not worry... Who is your family protecting, now?"

But Mion exclaimed: "She's not saying we're not in danger, you were the one who told it, before. Moreover, I thought that the Dam war was a closed chapter, so think twice, before attacking the others with no reason." She looked irritated at him, and Garuno realized what he had just said, concluding he'd better not to talk anymore. Rika thanked her friend, thinking about what had happened to make appease the village with Satoko, after the last Watanagashi. The epic fight to convince the Child Welfare Office to rescue her from Teppei had happened in the previous world, so they had to make it again. Fortunately, this time it had been simpler, Keiichi had directly gone and seen Oryou, and exactly as the other time they decided to make a compromise, claiming that Hinamizawa's forgiveness to Houjou-kun had been granted because of the boy's manliness which had been respected by the ruler of the Sonozaki family. And Teppei's death made things simpler, now she had Keiichi's father as foster parent, and no one was mistrustful towards her: in the end, nobody truly hated her, so nobody did mind about that decision. Therefore, Rika hoped that what happened with the Houjous could become a lesson to all of the villagers, even in this difficult situation.

So, Mion added: "However, I want to be really sure that research tells the truth, just like you. I will ask for some other geologist to check it again, it will take just some day."

"And what if it's right?" This was the most important question, they all feared the answer they didn't want to listen to. Fortunately, they didn't hear it. Mion lowered her eyes, and just answered "Please let's wait for the eventual confirm of the report, then I'll say my opinion about this."

Some minute after, when they council ended, Rika looked another time at Mion, while she was standing up and going out, without saying anything. Her mood looked very bad, she seemed tormented and anguished. She was so different from the joyful girl she had always known... She was tasting the heaviness of her new responsibilities, and she needed everyone's support. _I should say it to the club, tomorrow. We can't leave her alone. Even if Irie told me she can't suffer from the Syndrome, she's still..._

Suddenly a shadow interposed himself between Mion and her, forbidding her to see her friend any more. It was Irie-sensei, who, as usual, would have driven her from the council hall to home. She followed him to his car, and during the travel she spoke:

"Irie, do you know what this story means? If this danger is real we'll really have... to leave Hinamizawa, and without either fighting." After what had happened during the Dam War this sounded like an atrocious hoax, but the awkwardness she had tasted during the council didn't let her hope they would have been able to find a better solution.

Irie nodded: "I know it. But you are worried mostly about what would happen because of the Syndrome, aren't you? Well... the most important thing would be keeping all the villagers not far from you, in order to save their mental health. But this is nearly impossible, surely some of them would go far from us, to live with some relatives for example, and they would be condemned."

"And that sort of magic protein is not ready yet? Haven't you synthesized it?"

"No, unfortunately. Or, to be more exact, we've already did, but it looks like a very unstable molecule, so, even after having produced it, it divides quickly itself in simpler substances. Probably there is something else in Mion-san's blood which works as catalyst. At least, in some extreme case I could directly make a transfusion to heal some L5 patient, but this can't go for everyone: Mion-san's blood type is B+, as well as Satoshi-kun's one fortunately, therefore I can't give her blood to everyone, more than half the village would be excluded from this procedure. I'd have to study deeper it, but now..."

"So, what's your proposal? Mii-chan will listen to us, but we must have a good idea."

Irie was worried. He went on looking at the road, but his mind was thinking at something completely different: "Well... the final drug is not ready yet, we can't give it to them. We must keep the village united, next to you, then we should all go to some of the big condominiums located in big cities. It won't be cheap, but I don't see any other solutions. In any case we must avoid that even a single family only goes elsewhere, absolutely..."

"Is it practicable?"

"I hope so... But to do that, I feat that the only real way is..."

"...Revealing the existence of the Syndrome to the whole village, am I right?"

…

The following afternoon was a rainy one, ironically. Chie-sensei had allowed Mion not to attend lesson, she wouldn't have even listened to what she or another teacher had been saying. Her teacher had seen her eye sockets, probably she hadn't slept at all, during the last night. And even after the end of lessons she stayed sat on her chair, looking worried at the window. The sky was getting darker, the shortest days of the year were coming, and this didn't help her mood to improve. She really didn't feel like entertaining herself, in that moment, and all the activities had already been suspended for some day, since the afternoon she was given the results of that cursed study.

The whole club, however, was around her. They had been aware of the situation since the day after Mion had got the first dossier, her bad mood at school had immediately shown something was wrong, but none of them wanted to speak, as sign of respect. Indeed, the whole village lived in that sort of atmosphere, that day. After having been informed about the subject of the last council, nobody wanted to chat with anyone, or to laugh happily. Along those dirty roads, everybody's eyes were low on the ground, while they were going to work, or to school. They were scared of glancing up, to the mountains which could kill them.

And even from that window in the classroom, they weren't gazing at them. From there they could see only the road which went to Okinomiya, and to the bigger cities. All the students knew that they were probably going to travel across that way, to save their lives, and this was making them even more silents. So, that unreal quietness allowed them to hear each single drop of rain hitting the metal sheets leaned outside, not far from the entrance of the school, while a thin fog was starting to arise from the wet ground, contributing to darken the outside, and there was no wind blowing which could disperse it.

Mion finally decided to stand up, and once reached the window she went on looking the courtyard. Then, she started moving her finger on the steamy glass, slowly. Up, then down, then to the right, then down again. She was drawing a tiny cat. She had made so many of those for Rika in the past, when she was a very little child... After having finished it, she looked at it for a minute, smiling melancholically, then she returned at her desk, and she sat down again, without saying a word. In the meanwhile, rain went on falling, light and endless.

Keiichi had contemplated her while she was drawing, thoughtful, and finally he spoke: "Mion, could you tell us what are you planning to do? We'd like to know it... to give you a hand, if we're able to." The pony-tailed girl raised her head towards him, while he kept on speaking: "I am sure that you've already thought about the possible choices to take, if another confirm arrives... Have you already decided?"

She looked at him, silently, motionless and keeping her eyes on him. It was like she was thinking about a proper answer. Then she shook her head: "Really, I don't know... At the moment I can't do anything but waiting for the answer of that other expert, but if the mountains are really going to collapse on our head... The most logical choice would be to evacuate Hinamizawa... but how can I ask them to follow me elsewhere? Everyone in the village has born here, Kei-chan apart from your family, and from Ali-chan and Gi-chan... We have grown here, and we all had thought we would have died here. Leaving this valley would be such a terrible wound, some of them would likely commit suicide, and I can't allow it. Do you know? Most of you were elsewhere, some year ago, but you've been told it, during the Dam War we had fought for this place, we wanted, and still want, to stay here, we had even refused a good amount of money as refund. And we were strong enough to defend our rights. That day we felt like strong a sort of strong demons, worthy of their past and able to reach our aims, and without illegal means. But now... we don't either have an enemy to fight. Should we be angry against Oyashiro-sama now, for this cruel destiny? He's the only one we could consider as responsible..." she sighed "... but I don't believe in this kind of vengeful God, Oyashiro-sama should be a sort of peaceful patron, am I right?" Rika smiled, as to encourage her, then she said: "Yesterday the atmosphere in the hall was so dark, everyone was so sad, in the grip of their fears..."

"I can understand them." answered Keiichi "They all need to find a solution, or at least someone who can show it to them. Next time the whole club should be present at the council, they need all the support and the bravery we can give to them. Invite us, and you'll see the results, I'll smash their faces until they are ready to fight like lions!" Mion smiled, a bit relieved, but she didn't feel like kidding, or being joyful.

"Another matter is that a lot of people would lose everything they have, if we had to leave" said Satoko, agreeing with Keiichi "There are plenty of farmers, here, families entirely depending upon their rice fields. They would be completely broke, if they were forced to go away. And that would be frightfully tragic."

Mion caressed Satoko's head, and she explained: "This is a lesser problem, luckily. As Hinamizawa's ruler, it's my duty to grant to each of the inhabitants of my village the necessary goods to keep on living with dignity. It will be a large expense for the Sonozaki family, considering that we're losing lands, buildings and other goods because of this evacuation, but we can afford it."

"Rena wonders... Rena wonders, a bigger problem will be the people's fear about Oyashiro-sama's revenge. A lot of villagers still believe to it, and they might decide to stay here, without listening to us, even if that means risking their own life. Rena... Rena knows very well how men like them can feel, in those moments." The brown-haired girl's mind was turned at her sorrowful days in Ibaraki, when her only wish was to come back to Hinamizawa, and to obtain Oyashiro's forgiveness for her and her father. Now she was aware that the Monk was a sort of peaceful God, her heart had told her so, but in the past she was not so calm, and after the last baleful news neither most of the villagers were serene, maybe. Rika turned her eyes at her, to comfort her and to explain to her that she'd have made all the possible to convince them not to be scared by their protector, but she was anticipated:

"I see it. They could decide to disobey... even because they could prefer not to trust such a young leader, even under this sword of Damocles. Probably their confidence towards Oryou-sama is still bigger then the one towards you. Elderly people usually trust only elderly people, as well as young ones only trust young ones"

"Nii-chan!" Alice and the others didn't appreciate Giancarlo's comment, it wouldn't have raised Mion's mood for sure. He quickly apologized, regretful.

"It's all fine, don't worry" she answered "I had thought the same thing, indeed. Yesterday at the council everybody was scared, but nobody really seemed to look for help from me. Batcha is still their landmark, I fear, but she's too old to guide us, however, and her health is quickly worsening. I fear... that she'll leave us even before the arrival of this damned slide."

She was dramatically right. The phone of the school suddenly rang, and Mion was told to go instantly to the Irie Clinic together with her sister. Out of the school, a car was waiting for them, but strangely they found their father inside it, instead of Kasai. Something serious was happening. The man on the driver's seat just said _Mion, Shion, it's about y__our grandmother... _and they understood immediately. Mion was particularly bound to her, she had lived with her for a lot of time, and she taught her all she knew about ruling a family and a village; so, during the whole travel she did nothing but tapping the car mat with her right foot and biting her nails, nervously. Shion, instead, had not spent a lot of time with her, mostly she could talk to her only when she had switched her clothes with her sister's ones, and she was claiming to be Mion. Dressed as Shion, instead, she really had been able to create a friendly relationship only during the last months, after the last Watanagashi. Therefore, she was obviously concerned about her grandmother's state of health, too, but into the car she wasn't so tense as her sister: while seeing how much Mion cared about Oryou, Shion guessed to be really the child of a lesser God.

Finally they reached the Clinic, and Mion rushed inside, without either taking an umbrella to keep out of the still falling rain. Once inside, she found Kasai and her mother, waiting for them.

"Kasai, what's happened?"

"Mion-san... well, some of the members of the council had gone to ask her for help about the current situation, and having known it from them caused a heart attack to Oryou-sama..." Mion didn't say a word, shocked. Indeed, she hadn't told anything to her grand-mother, she wanted to find the best moment and words to do so. She couldn't lie to her forever for sure, she was conscious of Oryou's love towards her village, but she hoped to make her suffering as less as possible, in order to have her help too. And now they have told her everything so suddenly, so brutally...

But abruptly Mion finally began to yell: "How is it possible? I am the chief of the family, now, why have they gone to ask her for anything? They should have come to see me, not her, if they wanted to say or know something! Didn't they know what Hinamizawa means for her?" After an initial instant of loss, she was furious now. Her desire to make her grand-mother dodge other pains and worries had been one of the main reasons which had made her accept that promotion, she wanted her to spend the last period of her life peacefully, together with her family and both of her granddaughters... And now those insensitive dotards had nearly killed her, instead. "What are their names? I really have to have a chat with them! They'll learn that I am re-"

"Now stop, please, Mion." her mother interrupted her. "This is still a hospital, so shouting is rude of you. Moreover, this rage of yours won't change things. What do you think would happen, if your grand-mother was awake and could hear you saying this?"

Mion didn't feel like replying, gnashing her teeth to avoid crying. _I must be strong, I must be strong... Mion, learn from Kei-chan, learn from Kei-chan, learn from Kei-chan... _In that moment, the doctor came out of Oryou-sama's room. Mion raised her glance, while Shion and Kasai stood up, and Akane asked her mother's conditions.

Irie kept still for a second, looking at them, then he shook his head, apologizing.

…

Two days later, the whole village was present at Oryou's funeral. Most of them were outside, in the courtyard of the Sonozaki Manor, since they couldn't stay all in the main hall of the house. Fortunately it didn't rain anymore, even if the sky was still cloudy. While observing it before entering into the room where the funeral would have been celebrated, Kimiyoshi thought it was the right weather for their last greet to such a reserved person, and that she hadn't been that unlucky, she was spared the dark future waiting for all the others. Once entered in the hall, he found the whole Sonozaki clan and Rika Furude, who would have been the officiant of the funeral. The main hall was not far from the entrance, so they had opened all the doors, in order to allow everyone to see the rite, even from the outside.

Before everyone, Oryou's heiress, Mion Sonozaki, was looking at the altar. She couldn't wear the white kimono she was used to, she was an adult for her clan now. Her dress was a dark green one, with some simple decorations, and with a black belt on it. She had even untied her usual ponytail, and her hair was gathered all above her head, in a way similar to her mother's one. Since she had sat there, she had never moved from there, she had never turned her head towards anybody, she had never spoken to anyone. And she kept on so even when she heard Kimiyoshi entering. It was not coincidence, that man was the one she wanted to avoid most of all, that day she couldn't stand looking at him. It had been him to lead the group of old villagers who had meet Oryou, a couple of days before. And even if Mion was aware of her bad health conditions, she morally considered Kimiyoshi as the one who had killed her grandmother, he thought she was still too young to face such a crisis, that day, and he betrayed her trust. Then, she was sure she'd better avoid to talk with him, for a while, she desired not to say anything she could regret. And also Kimiyoshi preferred to stay in one of the corners of the room, while being quiet: he understandably was feeling uneasily.

Outside, but not far from their friend, Rena and Keiichi were attending the ceremony. They were wearing their usual winter school uniforms, but their happy days as students seemed so far. A sign of maturity by them was necessary. And then, Rena approached Keiichi abruptly, and she asked:

"Keiichi-kun, please listen... during the next days Mii-chan will be under pressure, and everyone will look for her, everyone will ask her what to do now... She needs someone who can be her strong support. Please... stay next to her, please." Keiichi nodded, and then Rena left the courtyard, quickly as if she was running away. The boy observed her while she was walking very fast, without understanding the real meaning of what her friend had been saying.

She was renouncing to him, for Mion's sake.


	16. Too bad to be true

**16 – Too bad to be true**

_Hinamizawa, 5th December 1983_

The Sonozaki Manor had always carried a dark shroud. Placed in the middle of the wood, next to the foot of the highest the mountains owned by the family, it had probably been built specifically to create that kind of illusion. Once gone through the gate, in fact, its large wings looked like the hands of a monster ready to eat whoever wanted to approach it, with both good or bad intention; it reflected the spirit their past owners wanted to show to the other inhabitants of the village, since its purpose was to scare and imbue respect into the rest of the village.

But unluckily, a disquieting atmosphere like that could protect only from humans, not from a soulless landslide. So, as soon as a dark green car arrived in front of the main entrance of the Sonozaki Manor, its three passengers, Rika, Satoshi and Satoko, were not downhearted because of the frightening building, and the worries inside their hearts were not due to the fear it could inspire. Someone was waiting for them, inside that giant house, since the whole club was expected to arrive there, as well as Irie-sensei, for a painful meeting.

Once they reached the guest room, they found everyone already inside. Now that sad meeting could start.

"Thank you for joining us here, today." said Keiichi. After Oryou's funeral, he had come forward and he had asked Mion to stay some day at her house, as Rena had suggested to him, to help her in that difficult period. The pony-tailed girl had been very glad to hear that offer coming from him, and she had gladly accepted. And so she was now next to him, attending the meeting without speaking for the moment, and letting Keiichi pronounce the phrases usually said by the master of the whose who receives his guests.

They had neither gone to school in those last days, the crisis had forced them to be occupied all the day, so Chie-sensei and the Principal had been understanding towards them, allowing them to stay home and to face the situation to the best of their ability; so, even the rest of the group had preferred not to disturb the couple, before being called by them. However, they were aware theirs was not an official engagement yet, that was not the best moment for such a happy event, but for now it was absolutely enough, especially for her. Keiichi had been a marvellous support, someone she would have never managed to do without, and he was going to keep on being so. Even Shion had given up teasing them, that house sharing would have been a wonderful opportunity to mock them, but the recent facts had made her depressed in turn. She would have been waited for better times, to mock them.

Were these times about to arrive again? Nobody of them could say it, but the premises were not encouraging. In fact, Keiichi kept on speaking: "We are asking for your help... the next days will be very hard, for all our community, we'll need all the possible help you can give."

"So you've decided to..."

"...to evacuate Hinamizawa. Yes, it's painful, incredibly painful. But it's the only solution. Even the second geologist we've contacted has answered that the calculations of the research are correct, so it really looks like there is not any chance that the expert who wrote it was wrong. Tomorrow we'll gather everyone in a giant council, and we'll announce it."

That was a drastic choice, but not unexpected. Everybody was already prepared to it, imagining that a different outcome was nearly impossible. "It's a pity, but Rena knows you're doing your best... However, where are we going to move, where are we?"

"As Irie-sensei had suggested us, we'll move into a large group of new buildings located in Nagoya. They have just completed them, and now they are looking for buyers. Since we're buying up them, we can also hope in a little discount."

Hearing these last words, Giancarlo eyed him, thoughtful, and after a pair of seconds Keiichi noticed it: "Hmmm... do you want to ask for something, Giancarlo?"

"No... nothing." he answered, turning his glance elsewhere. But Alice, attending the scene, rapidly understood what there was in her brother's mind. _If in such a moment they talk about money, they don't do it as a joke for sure... They'll probably only give a contribution to each family, and they won't pay for everything, but even so we're discussing about spending an authentic fortune, a bad blow to endure... I hope the Sonozaki family has really money enough to afford this enormous expense. _

"And... about the Syndrome?" asked then Rika. Irie answered:

"Rika-chan, as I had told you a couple of days ago the best solution is telling the truth to everyone. Carrying on lying would cause problems and tensions, and in this case someone's level of stress could increase until reaching... well, you know. I only hope everyone is going to trust us, but I'm afraid that a lot of the villagers will consider it a bad joke, made in the worst moment possible. That's why we need you to support us, to make them understand that this is the truth, and that their life will be soon in danger, if they don't hearken to us."

"But once they go on staying by me and the other villagers, we could get along without saying it..."

"The problem is that in a big city like that you can't control everybody. What if a stressed subject simply takes the bus, or the subway, and then he goes far enough to be able to develop the symptoms?" Rika lowered her eyes, comprehending the medic's argument, then Irie went on: "Of course, this means that they won't be allowed to work out of Nagoya, and they can't to have holidays far from there. It's just like what happens now in the village, but after the transfer this obligation will be much more similar to a prison, for a lot of us. I fear... I fear that there will be quite a high number of quarrels, once we have moved there. We must be ready to be strong, to avoid that the situation definitely degenerates."

Rena looked at Mion, who hadn't said a word yet, and who was keeping her eyes low. She was sure her poor friend was feeling guilty of the whole situation, and this certainty was overwhelming her. Probably Keiichi had already tried to solace her, but he had not been enough, and he had to take care of all the matters about this disaster, after all. If neither he had been able to comfort her, her morale had to be really low... Or maybe the truth was rather another one: Keiichi had truly managed to embolden her a little, and without his help she would have been sicker, she would have risked to suffer from a complete breakdown, and the whole village would have been in panic, without a leader. For Rena, it was hard to say which was the real one, between these scenarios, but in both of these cases Mion needed to get support from the whole group. The brown-haired girl then decided to stand up, and she sat next to her, silent. She was waiting for her to speak, and finally her friend opened her mouth:

"Rena-chan... in your opinion... could I have done anything more than this? Please, be sincere."

Irie stopped speaking after hearing her, that sentence showed all the malaise that girl was feeling. As for Rena, her intuition was suggesting to her that Mion had likely made a similar question even to Keiichi and Shion, and to her mother too. So she didn't answer immediately, she was thinking about the best words to use, but she couldn't neither wait too much time, she had heard her friend was starting sobbing.

"Mii-chan" she answered in the end "It's not a matter about what _you _were able to do. You belong to a club, have you forgotten? And you belong also to a village whose Spirit has always involved the whole community, and not only an isolated person. As our ruler you're taking responsibility for all of us, but if you are wrong about a thing, we all are so, then. In difficulties we always act as one single individual, so we share right decisions and wrong ones. That's why you've rightly looked for everyone's help and advice, am I wrong, am I?"

And Alice added "No, Rena-chan is not wrong at all. Moreover, this is one of those events where, paradoxically, what you can do is in front of your eyes. You can't forbid these mountains to collapse" she exclaimed while pointing at the map shown at the council, which was now leaned on the table "But if you're the chief of the village, then you must become a landmark. Show your courage and dignity, be a support for your friends, and a guide for who you think to be able to help."

Mion smiled, appreciating the words pronounced by Alice, who went on: "Twenty years ago, in Italy, a giant landslide had nearly destroyed the Vayont Valley, and had killed 2000 people. Once you are able to move us out of here, and this landslide arrives without taking anybody's life, you will save 2000 people. I know that leaving your ancestors' land will be a shock, but saving all of us will be an astonishing result, worthy of a great leader! And of course, my brother and I will help you as much as possible, even if we have been vaccinated from the Syndrome, we won't leave you alone. And once we've finished this transfer, we'll have a great chance to search for new club activities, we still have to spend six-seven months here!"

"Alice is right!" exclaimed Keiichi, taking strongly Mion by her nose with his fingers and keeping it until she started shouting, and chasing him with her hands.

"You, damn... Next time you do this this old lady will tear your fingers to ribbons with a mincer, and I'll make some jam with them!"

"Sometimes I wonder why Onee has some obsession for torturing Kei-chan..." Mion blushed passionately, and she screamed to prevent her sister from keeping on speaking. Then, she began to try somehow to catch her while she was running away, while the others laughed, relieved.

"Rena is happy to see Mii-chan so active again! We'll do everything necessary, and when it is finished we'll go back to our normal life, I'll find even a new Dump with so many nice things to bring to home! Hauuu, cuties to briiiiingggg to hooooomme!"

"Dump? What is the Dump, Rena-chan?"

"Oh, sure, Gi-chan has never seen it..." Rika exclaimed, then Satoko explained "It's a sort of tip on the border of the village... an illegal one, if I have been told right. Rena often visits it, and she usually takes away something cute. Or at least something she thinks is cute."

"Oh, Satoko-chan is so mean, hauuu... I won't scoop her up anymore..." Satoko then laughed, as if she was saying she didn't believe that was a bad thing. In the meanwhile, Alice was observing them, becoming curious: _I don't understand if they were behaving so just to improve Mion's mood or if they are serious..._

"The border of the village, you said..." Giancarlo commented, looking at the map. Rena took it, and she showed to him the exact zone where it was: "It's on a little mountain, here, and it's marked with a red pencil, so it's a dangerous place now. But it's not strange, all the mountains around it have the same color, on this map."

"Is it the place where you took that wooden statue from? That one Satoko-chan used on Kei-chan's head the other time, I mean."

"Ho ho ho ho, that episode must have shocked you..." Keiichi turned pale, after Satoko had reminded him what had happened that day "However, yes, that's the place it comes from."

"Ah." he simply answered.

"Well, we are ready, I'd say!" shouted Mion "This old lady is ready to lead her people to a new promised land, full of milk and honey! We'll make them regain their lost smiles, and we'll kick their asses if they don't!" Nearly everybody laughed, and Irie looked like particularly heartened by Mion's reaction, while Rika was simply happy to see her so lively. She knew it, now that girl previously so sad had become the old good Mion again, and the heaviness of being the ruler in such a hard moment wasn't so painful as a few minutes before; Keiichi, Rena, and all the others had made a great job.

They were all joking and having fun, now, within that so peacefully environment. Of course, it might seem strange to act so in such a moment, but it was just like when Mion had created the club, years before, in order to help Satoko to be calmer, and to keep her far from their house when her Aunt was there. In that period Satoshi feared not to be enough to protect her, and the club had been the solution to all their problems. They had begun to spend beautiful afternoons as carefree students, even if Satoshi and Satoko's life was not happy; but that was not a sign of indifference at all, on the contrary it was the best way to help them. So, even in that day they were acting joyfully and thoughtlessly, and they were doing it also to improve their own mood, to be ready to face the hard challenge in front of them. It wouldn't have been easy, but their souls wouldn't have been defeated either by Hinamizawa's disappearance...

"Nii-chan, what are thinking about, now?"

Alice was looking at his brother searching for something on the map, while holding the full dossier about the hydrogeologic situation of the village. The others were still surrounding Keiichi and Mion, laughing and joking, like what they would do with a couple of newlyweds, and they even didn't notice him.

"What are you seeking, Nii-chan? I didn't know you were an expert about that field..."

"And I am not, in fact. I just want to check a thing, a little trifle... On the map, the zone of the Dump is marked as number 07, so... let's look for it in this book..." He found the corresponding page, and he read it for a minute. As for Alice, who was by him, from that position she could barely see a table whose title was "Chemical composition of the ground", another one named "Observations about the orogenic structure" and some other text, which she couldn't either try to read because her brother closed the volume, commenting "Hmm... No, it would be absurd. Probably I'm just wrong."

"Why are you saying so, Nii-chan? What's the problem?"

"Nah, just a little doubt which had come into my mind. We were talking about that wooden statue, before." Alice nodded, then he opened the dossier again, looking for the page he was reading before. "Look at the first table of the page, it says the ground of the zone where the Dump stands is predominantly pebbly and clayey, you can see the percentages."

"So?" An unexpected voice reached his ears. He raised his eyes, and he realized the whole group was looking at him, got curious by what he was saying. He instantly blushed, and he yelled: "Y-you were listening to me!"

"Sure we were! You shouldn't speak aloud if you don't want to be heard. Now go on, what's your imaginary doubt about that page?"

"Oh... nothing special, nothing special, surely I'm wrong."

"This is not a proper answer, Gi-chan! You'd better think about a better one, or this old lady will make you regret being born..." Looking at her murdering glance, he'd have liked answering annoyed _Oh, Miss PainInTheNeck has really revived after having thought you were a nothingness, hmm? _But after seeing her so sad and downhearted in the last days he decided it was fair to give her some other moment of ease, helping a friend means also this, so he just went on explaining:

"I am sure you remember that Kei-chan had made us notice that statue was dirt, when it crashed on his head. There was some soil on it."

"And..."

"And... if my memory is right, it was very dark and fat, like loam, nearly dung, if I can use this term. If it was like what this work says it would have been much lighter, invisible to see on the brown wood."

"It's strange, I agree, there really were those dark dabs, cleaning them after the trap had worked had been so hard... But could it have been only some loam, indeed, fallen from some flowerpot thrown into the Dump?" asked Satoko.

"Now that you've mentioned it, there was no earthenware next to it, when I've found it." answered Rena "But I remember it was slightly sunk into the ground. Picking it up had been so difficult, it had been. But I really wanted to bring it home, it was so cute..."

"And so those dabs were really caused by the actual ground below the Dump..." concluded Satoko.

"Wait a minute, now, I don't understand what you mean. Are you saying there is a mistake in this dossier? But an expert made it, and two different technicians have confirmed it is correct."

"They told _its calculations_ were correct, Mii-chan" observed Giancarlo "But they didn't check the starting data, they trusted what it was written here. I don't blame them, thinking they are wrong would have been unusual, since this should be quite a basic collecting, I guess, and controlling it would have meant coming here for another and probably useless sampling."

"So the point is that the analysis followed by the scientist is good on its own, but its last result is worthless because the point of departure he started from, the data he had collected, is totally wrong. Have I got it?"

"Yes. It's just like the process who makes you go to the kitchen starting from your bedroom: you go downstairs, you open a door... If you start from your real room those instructions will guide you correctly, but if you are, for example, in the courtyard, you might suddenly arrive at the cellar, even if you followed those steps in the right way" Satoko laughed, while hearing that example "But I could be even more extreme: how could they make a correct sampling of the whole ground if all the zone, or at least the most of it, is covered by a pit? I've never seen it, but if it's really an unloading I don't think they've put the wastes in a little corner of the mountain. They have rather thrown it away randomly, covering the whole surface." Rena nodded, to confirm it.

"Wait a second... can I look at those pages, please?" Keiichi took the dossier, and started reading: "I see... there are no references about the Dump... If the near mountain collapsed that moving wastes would be a further danger, something to report absolutely. There are a lot of heavy metal objects, and these famed landslide would fire them here and there... But here, instead... there is neither a word about it."

"So are there really mistakes, here?" asked Rika "Are you saying that Hinamizawa is safe?"

"You are running too fast now, Rika-chan." answered Keiichi "Surely something doesn't work here, in the paragraph about the Dump. Just as if that scientist had never seen it... Hmm... Mion, do you remember when that man had come here to make the surveys?"

"Well... It was on 11st October, if I am right. He came to our Manor with his little team, and he told me that it would have taken three or four days to make the complete..."

"11st October?" Satoko interrupted her "Ho Hoo... The figures don't add up..." The others looked at her with a questioning glance, and so she said: "You should know that Rika's house is protected by one of my... erm... harmless alarm systems, just to be sure that a thief couldn't enter inside. That device, in particular, has been made to cover both of the ways which start from the building. The first leads to the Furude Shrine, and then to Hinamizawa, the second to a path into the woods, which is the only way to reach that zone of the mountain."

"Sometimes you will really harm someone, with your contraptions..." Keiichi murmured.

"Tsk, what a villain you are. I always know what I'm doing, differently from someone else, here. Anyways, I still regularly check the system I was speaking about before, even after joining Nii-Nii at our home, and I can swear that nobody has ever been on the mountain behind the Shrine since September. Despite this, I can see on this map they have divided it into multiple sectors, and it is marked mostly with a yellow color, which shows a lesser danger, but which means that they claim to have studied it."

"A very good work, Satoko, you're your brother's pride." exclaimed Satoshi, caressing her head while she was blushing because of the compliments.

"Satoko-chan is a smart girl, and she's learning from her Nee-Nee." answered Shion, buying up merits not belonging to her. "But so this poor excuse for an expert really looks not to have made what he had been paid for. I wonder if that day he just visited our Manor before going back home."

"I agree with you." said Giancarlo "I do think he didn't controlled in person all the valley, and this explains all those mistakes about he Dump. I wouldn't be surprised, if he has just used what was present on the other maps of the zone, for example checking the land register... But since the Dump is an illegal pit, as Satoko-chan said a few seconds ago, it's like it was non-existent, for the prefecture."

"We can be even more certain about all these mistakes" proposed Irie, who had stayed silent in those minutes "Just wait for me some moment. Mion-san, Shion-san, could you come with me? You should open a room with one of your keys, please." They stood up, and they exited from the room. They came back after some minute, carrying some notebook.

Rika opened her eyes wide: "These are... Takano's scrapbooks!"

Irie nodded: "Yes, you're right. These sheets are full of their theories, of their tales... But the fact is that I believe that some of them could give a hand to us. Her grandfather, as you already know, had made researches about the Syndrome, in order to discover everything about it. Since he knew that its origin was linked with the Swamp not far from Hinamizawa, he had made also a complete analysis of the territory around here. Well, maybe it's not so complete, probably he didn't care some of the zones, and I know these are old datas, but they can be still useful."

"Do you want to know why they are here, am I right, Rika-chan?" Rika answered affirmatively to Shion's question. "Well... they were useful when the prefect and Oishi-san had to close this case, so they had confiscated them. However, you are aware of who the prefect is, so here they are... Ah, the importance of having relatives everywhere."

"Personally I don't understand why you are showing them only now..." Alice's glance fulminated her brother, guilty of that stupid comment, then they opened the books Irie had brought. In the following thirty minutes the whole group confronted the two works, finding an infinity of differences and incoherences. And since Irie was sure of the reliability of Takano's research, the wrong one was the other work. They stopped after half the dossier, nearly, its inaccuracy was rather obvious thereupon.

"So? We now that this heavy book is just trash... But... how it's possible? How can that man have made so many mistakes?"

"Mion, he can't have made them incidentally, I imagine he was not such a stupid. So... we can't think anything but he did so on purpose."

"But, why, Kei-chan? And all the other landslides happened, how can we explain them? I really don't understand..."

"Neither I. We should make our ideas clear, and make a call to this fellow."

"I think it's a bad idea." noticed Satoko "I don't know if he was sure not to be unmasked, but if I were him and someone phoned to tell me they are aware of the mess I've caused, I'd escape quickly to a safe place. It's much better to say these things to him personally, making sure he can't run away anywhere."

"Then I might phone him, claiming to be one of his accomplices, and say _They have discovered us, let's go away_! That would be an awesome trap, panic is people's worst enemy."

"Are you getting stupid, Keiichi-san? It's useless. Surely he has some helper at his disposal, he didn't pay a visit alone at the Manor, that day. But you don't even know his accomplices' names, or their voices. Your only chance to mislead he would be telling you have a cold, and so you could use also your real voice, but it's too complicated. Moreover, we are all saying he is a criminal, now, but maybe it's just an idiot who has made a quick and approximated work."

"Satoko, stop mocking me again! So, do you really think that, if we ask him to come here, he won't understand that something is wrong and that it's safest for him to stay far from Hinamizawa?"

"Hmmm... this villain has really got a point, finally." Keiichi giggled, noticing how Satoko had got annoyed thanks to his correct remark, and the girl said: "I'd say we must think about a proper strategy. I suppose you or someone else here knows where his studio is, for example... Ah, sure, by the way, Mion-san, why have you decided to contact him? Did you already know him?"

"No, we have never heard of him. It had been... _Kimiyoshi-san_ who made his name." while spelling these last words, Mion got lightly angry, again. She had not forgotten what had happened to her grandmother, yet. "He said that some old friend of him told him that he was a good technician, and nobody had anything against him, so he was charged to make this study. At least this is what I was told, I was not present during that evening."

"We should make some question to Kimiyoshi-san, and to these strange friends too. By the way, what should we do, Mion, now? If this work turns out to be a fake and we aren't risking to die, everyone must be informed of it at once!"

"I'll surely do so, Kei-chan. I'll ask for everyone to come to the council, and we'll decide what to do. Probably that idiot we have defined _expert_ until now will be denounced, I don't know if he has made this mess on purpose, but next time he will learn to do things in the right way." Mion was smiling, satisfied. _Yes, and Kimiyoshi-san is going to make a poor figure, yes. _She had to be a landmark, as her friends had said, but she wasn't forced to abandon her feelings; she wouldn't have forgiven him until he publicly had apologized, she had already decided that.

…

"Ah, Rena, have you come back? Please, come here!"

"Here I am, Dad! What do you need?" Evening had come, and, while cooking for dinner, Rena was still quite excited. She didn't know whether to go on being worried about the mortal landslide which was theoretically still menacing them, or to be happy because that danger itself looked to be only an unreal one. Unless they didn't prove it was to never occur, she would have always been a bit concerned, comprehensibly.

As for her father, he had easily noticed her frame of mind, but he preferred to tell her at once why he had called her: "In our mailbox I found this, when I had come back from work. It has been addressed to you." Rena took the big and thick envelope, without the name of the sender. But the postmark on it showed it came from Ibaraki. Had it been by her mother, perhaps? No, she would have written her name, probably, and that woman was aware that her daughter didn't want to have anything to do with her, now. So who had sent it? Rena had a bad foreboding, and to get it out of her mind she instantly tore it to see its content. Inside, three articles from different newspapers, each of them concerning a boy's death. All of them were nearly as aged as Rena herself, and the dates on the newspapers were recent: 12nd November on two of them, 29th November on the third one. Rena didn't understand their meaning, so she read their names written on the articles: the three victims were named Seohara Koji, Shikoku Kamui and Ozaki Basho.

Rena was puzzled, those names didn't sound new to her... and, while looking at their photos, she was thinking to have already met them somewhere. But suddenly she heard her father calling her in a thready voice, and when she turned her eyes at him she noticed he had turned pale, while looking at the inner side of the torn envelope she was still holding. On it, some big word written with red color, invisible from the outside because of the thickness of the paper.

_Guess who will be the next one, Reina._


	17. Pursuing past

**17 – Pursuing past**

_Okinomiya, 6th December 1983_

"I'd say you are not here to pay me a visit, Alice..."

The police station in Okinomiya was in a state of agitation, and the near village of Hinamizawa was the cause of that chaos. In the previous evening, all its inhabitants had been informed that the research which had announced an oncoming giant landslide was a fake, and that a new study would have been made, to be sure that they were not in danger. Furious, the villagers had contacted repeatedly its author, who had never answered, and they hadn't managed to find him in his studio in Okinomiya. He seemed disappeared, which was something very suspicious. So they contacted the police, to solve the situation and find that likely humbug, and at the station they knew the consequences of making Himamizawa's city council angry, so they started the investigation forthwith. However, pretending to see the case closed after only 24 hours was utopian, and in that evening the officers were still in the starting phase of the inquiry. And it wouldn't have been that easy, as Flavia explained to the people arrived there to see her.

"Paruyuki-san doesn't look to be a ingenuous, he had made provision for eventualities like this..."

"Paruyuki-san? Was this really his name?"

"Yes... But if you prefer so, I can still call him _the_ _expert_, since everyone has derogatorily hung this label on him, anywhere near you. Anyways, the fact is that he has withdrawn all the money he had in his current account, and he did it some day before presenting his work, without waiting for the Sonozakis' payment. It has been something purposeful, to put off the scent: now, if he used his credit card we would have found him easily, but since he's clearly paying only cash..."

"So he was sure they would have unearthed the truth" commented Rena's father "He had got ready to escape even before they had begun to seek him. But once you find him, what he will be accused of? Of being an idiot who wasn't able to do his job?"

"Causing an unmotivated alarm is a crime, indeed. But that's not his only problem. Do you remember that there had been some other landslide, previously? They had been the main factor who had pressed the community to ask for his help, and so we wanted to check them... And one of them drew our attention. Maybe it was the third... or the fourth one, I can't recollect which; however, not far from the place where the slide had begun, we found some trace of explosive."

"S-so did he use bombs to cause them? But why did nobody hear them, why?"

"Not every explosive is so noisy, Ryuugu-san. There are powders that are far more silent than TNT, but which have its same effect. It's enough to put them in some fitting place in the open air, such as inside a crack into a big rock or under the soil: in this way, they gather gradually the humidity present around them, becoming a sort of dense gel and expanding more and more, until they make the adjacent stones fall, reaching their aim. This process is quite slow, moreover, it takes more than half an hour, but this is not said to be a misfortune for a criminal: if you need to, you can also go away and claim to be elsewhere when the powder has an effect."

"But if this was the process, there was surely some trace of that swill somewhere, or am I wrong?"

"I was about to tell it. The zones where every slide had started were isolated places, far from buildings and rice fields, so he also could calmly recuperate that substance after the end of the landfall, because the gel always remained in the starting point of the slide, without falling down. Moreover, those had all been little phenomenons, you had seen them, and he had chosen properly the zones of origin of the landslip, looking for the most friable soils; so, a very small quantity of powder would was always enough, and there were no traces of it on the fallen rocks. We were lucky to find it anyway, probably he hadn't noticed there was still some of substance on the ground, that time."

Satoko would have been in ecstasy, if she could have heard those priceless notions. Rena, instead, limited herself to nod. Flavia was politely answering to her questions, because she wanted to create a trusted relationship between them, to use it in the following minutes.

"I still don't understand why he has done such a idiocy, I don't."

"We'll ask for it when we catch him. There are not airline tickets sold in his name, for now, but I can't exclude he wants to leave the country with a fake one. However, I don't think his escape will be successful: even the Nabihas, who made his name to realize the research, are looking for him. They had trusted him, until now, and now they have denounced him to save their honour, or something similar..." Flavia scratched her head "Well, they've made a real poor figure, and the friendship between the Kimiyoshis and them will be heavily damaged, I suppose. However, I don't think you are here because of this, you already knew most of these details..."

Rena nodded. The letter she had received the evening before couldn't be ignored, so she had decided to go to the police station with her father. And they had asked Alice to come with them, in order to make sure to see directly the inspectress. Rena had not told anyone else about this subject, because she was afraid of being a further problem for the whole group: the already famous Landslide Affair alone was sufficient to make the others busy, especially Mion and Keiichi. _Mion and Keiichi._.. Rena shook her head, trying not to think about them. She opened her purse, and she took the envelope containing those newspaper cuttings, handling to Flavia. The woman then wore a glove, and she took the torn pieces of paper to examine what she was given. The red words written on the inside were easily readable now, thanks to the rip. The inspectress opened her little agenda, and wrote some note, then she put everything in a plastic bag.

"I'll have to ask you for your fingerprints, later. Yours will be present for sure on the envelope and on the cuttings, but I hope to find also other ones. By the way, Ryuugu-san, had you already met these boys, before?"

"Well... Rena is not sure." Rena stopped speaking, but Flavia didn't answer, to let her go on "Those articles come from Ibaraki's local newspaper, and those boys are as aged as me. Moreover, when I read those surnames... in these photos they are older, they had grown up, so I am not sure, but I think to remember... at least two of them. In Ibaraki" she swallowed "They were the boys I had assaulted with a metal bar."

Rena's father put his hand on her daughter's head, pushing it towards his chest. Then he went on speaking, in her stead: "Those surnames sounded familiar to me too, but I wasn't sure, either. It was Rena who made my doubts disappear, beginning to talk with me about our past live down there: it was obvious she had had my same idea. You know, their families had even renounced to denounce her, although one of them had got some serious damage at one of his eyes. It was about... Seohara-san, if I am right, and in fact you could see he was wearing glasses, on his photo on the cutting about him."

Flavia took the article from the bag, to check that detail, and then he went on: "I had never been explained why they decided outwardly to ignore what it happened, but I think they wanted to harm her somewhat, and their fathers were aware of that... The three boys involved were attending the same class, but after that event two of them were sent to another one, and the third one was even expelled, just as if they wanted them to avoid their mutual bad influence."

"If nobody has denounced this fact, I will find nothing in the archives, even if I will check them anyway, maybe those people are previous offenders, in spite of their age, and they are present in some other case file, on the score of something else... Please go on, tell me everything you know."

"There's not much more to add, neither Rena remembers the details exactly. Simply, after that, she began to persistently ask for me to come back to Hinamizawa with her, and after a short discussion we decided to content her, and to return to our birthplace. After these two years, I can say we made the right choice, in that city she was always sad and depressed, instead here she's much more quiet and happy."

Flavia looked at Alice, who nodded. For already some week, Flavia had been informed about the Syndrome, too: after all they were sisters, and in this way the inspectress could imagine the other implications hidden behind that seemingly innocent sentence. While writing the minute she was going to keep it carefully in mind, avoiding to report her past assault, and claiming only that _she knew those victims_. Otherwise, some police officer from Ibaraki might suddenly become too interested in her, and that would have been quite a troublesome issue, especially in those days. It was good to convince Flavia's colleagues to abstain from doing too many questions.

Besides, it was curious how her father had been saying _we decided_, _we've made..._ despite the fact that Rena's mother had already left him, when they had gone back to Hinamizawa. In that family there was only one relative who hypothetically took decisions, but he had been using plural forms. So, since that man didn't seem someone with a strong authority, that girl had a big influence on him, for sure. And so, while repeating the man's last words in her mind, Alice was reflecting about the fact that Rena seemed to have a strong character, but at the same time she was a serene and understanding girl, one who a positive attitude and who didn't smother the ones around her. _Now that she isn't looking after Kei-chan anymore, maybe she could get interested in someone else, and then she would be his ideal girlfriend..._

The cracked smile on Alice's face was saying a lot about what was coming into her mind. As for Flavia, instead, thank God she was concentrated on her job, since she was reading the girl's documents: "Can I ask you something, Ryuugu-san? Here I can read your daughter's name is _Reina, _but you are calling her _Rena_... Even Alice usually calls her so, I know. So... is this just a typing error? You should go to fix it, it could cause you..."

"Ah... no. She has independently decided to call herself Rena, when she has come here again, and everyone in Hinamizawa knows her with that name, now. Oh, well, when she's adult she'll be able to decide if going to the registry office, or keeping her old name. You shouldn't worry about it..."

"Oh, no, I didn't want to criticize her... I just wanted to be sure about this typo. You know, these articles talk about recent facts, there must already be an inquiry in Ibaraki about their deaths, and they are probably trying to find a common guilty, a link between all these murders, after all the victims belonged to the same group. Their minutes are still protected by secrecy, I fear, but I guess I can however find some info, I've known someone there since my period in the police academy... Only, if there is already something about you, they'll have written about a girl named _Reina_ and not _Rena_, so you can see why I was caring it."

While keeping her head on her father's chest, Rena looked at her, hearing they were calling her _Reina._ She was getting a bit nervous, she hated her old name, she detested it. So Flavia, to soothe her, went on, smiling: "Listen, Ryuugu-san, after I have reported about this story, probably someone from Ibaraki will come here, to ask you for some question. It won't be that hard, they'll want to know the relationship between you and them, and all that kind of things which will make them feel better. It's something necessary, and moreover" she took the bag containing the minatory letter "we'll found the author of this bad joke much quicker in this way."

"Does Rena... have to talk about that incident, too?" asked her father. It would have been painful, understandably. Flavia thought about an answer, but Rena was faster:

"If it's necessary, I'm doing it. Rena is ready to face her past."

"Very brave answer, young woman. Yes, it's the safest solution, and you're risking nothing because of it, no one had been seriously injured that time, and no one had denounced it. I really can guess nobody will care about it, they all are focusing only on finding the serial killer... If there is one. And so, in their opinion yours had been finally only a little scuffle... Well, so let's arrange this bother at once, do you agree?" Rena nodded, and Flavia went on, winking: "If you prefer so, I'll allow them only a full interrogation, in my presence, and then, if they want to know something else, they'll have to tell me what they want to find, and I'll tell you their requests. They will have nothing against this, coming here from that city has always been a nuisance for them, they feel so superior... So, do you agree about this? Do you trust me more than a foreigner, don't you?"

Rena started to laugh: "Rena thinks you are quite strange, but Rena likes you!" Frankly Flavia didn't appreciate that _strange _very much, but she tried to hide it, aware that offending her was what the brown-haired girl wanted the least.

"Good. So, let's think about some possible hypothesis. Hmmm... let's see... Connecting your past to their deaths seems the most obvious choice, and in this case we should look for someone else who was present, in that place and in that moment. So... are you sure that that group was made of _three_ boys, and not of _four_, for example?"

Rena lowered her head, thinking with a melancholic face. Then, after a dozen of seconds: "They were three, no more than three. Rena is sure, this time. I can't recall that scene completely, but I had been seeing them as _three_ monsters, I can't be wrong."

"Good" answered Flavia, standing up from her chair and sitting on her desk, to create an informal environment and to make sure to keep Rena calm. "We can exclude this, so... What about an external witness? Well... It's... hardly possible, I'd say. Since there are no minutes, we can't say anything against his presence, but if they had been desiring to do something bad against you, as your father told me, you were in an isolated place, I imagine." Rena nodded again, a bit uneasy. "But maybe someone had followed you, who knows. Other hypotheses... Nah, it's too early to list all of them. Let's wait for what the fingerprints have to tell us, and then we're going to make our conclusions."

Flavia stood up, again, and she went to Rena, holding out her hand: "Don't worry, Rena-chan, can I call you so? I'm giving you my word, young woman, everything will run fine!" The girl in front of her smiled, and accepted her invitation, shaking her hand with her. Then, she thanked her, and she started to go towards the exit door.

"Hey, wait, Rena-chan! Since it's late, and my shift is nearly over, let's all go to Alice's house! You and your father will be our guests of honor! Just wait a second, after an agent has taken your fingerprints I will phone my husband to tell him where he has to go."

"This is a great idea!" Alice agreed "I really want to have a noisy dinner tonight, together with some good friend!"

"Are you sure? We wouldn't like to disturb..." Rena looked at Alice, who replied with a smile.

"Disturb? What the heck are you talking about? Don't pester yourself with this, it will be a real pleasure! However," she concluded sarcastically "Flavia'd better not to cook, I'd like to survive to this evening, and she's a real disaster in every kitchen she sets foot on..."

…

That evening, at the Sonozaki Manor, the phone rang. It was very late, Mion had already gone to bed, and nearly all the others too. _This is a very tiring period, they need to rest. So why are they calling, now? I hope it's not anything serious. _He took the receiver and answered. It was Kimiyoshi, and he was looking for Keiichi, indeed.

"Maebara-san, please listen to me... During this whole day all the inhabitants had been talking about this disturbing story... and it seems that something bad happened, again."

His bad presage was true, but his interlocutor didn't need to say it openly, to make him realize it. Keiichi could clearly hearing him panting, from the receiver. It was a bad period, for him who was still one of Hinamizawa's chiefs. Due to his proposal at the October's council, Kimiyoshi was still feeling guilty, and as a matter of fact he had publicly apologized for his mistake. But he hadn't done the same for visiting Oryou and causing her heart attack. Maybe he hadn't realized his had been a bad choice yet, or maybe he was still believing not to be responsible for her death, but this decision had pressed Mion to behave even more coldly towards him. That was why he preferred to avoid her for the moment, and to speak rather directly with Keiichi. Finally, it had not been a bad idea, for her, to go to bed early that night.

"Maebara-san" Kimiyoshi kept on speaking "This evening, less than a hour ago, some of the villagers came to me, and... and they revealed me that some day ago they had sold their houses."

Keiichi didn't answer immediately due to the shock. He was expecting bad news, but not this. He stayed silent for a while, and only later he began to stammer: "How... how is it possible?"

"It seems that someone phoned them, the day after Sonozaki-san had revealed us about the results of that famous research. An unspecified office from the Government, none of them remembers its exact name, it was a very long and complicated one. They were told that the State was aware of their situation, that the... _the expert _had shown his work to the prefecture too. So, to help them in that difficult moment, they were offered a sum of money as compensation, nearly equal to the worth of their houses and fields. It was less than what they had offered during the Dam War, but in the last days the set up was terribly critical, and a lot of them quickly accepted. A little group of appointees then has come to Hinamizawa, and it seems that they've signed a lot of contracts."

"A lot of contracts, you're saying... how many, exactly?"

"I can't be sure, I couldn't ask everyone, and neither the ones come to me could say it... However, we have 95 confirmed cases, but very likely they are more than one hundred." Keiichi swallowed, while Kiichiro added: "This matter involves more than 300 villagers, counting also the relatives of who has signed... it's the 15% of the whole Hinamizawa, at least."

"In just three or four days? No, let me reflect a second. Nearly one family out of five has sold everything, then? And I imagine that other ones had been contacted, but they refused... But here nobody came, and neither my parents know about this story, they would have informed me."

"Neither we have been contacted."

"And none of the members of our club has reported us about it, until now, they were in the dark too... So, why?"

"I... I have an hypothesis to explain this, Maebara-san. When I read the list of names they had brought to me, I had noticed at once they nearly all were old farmers, or humble workers..."

"I see what you mean. They have looked for the poorest inhabitants... the simplest to convince." Yes, this made a sense, and that theory could also explain why his friends hadn't noticed it. The Three Great Families would have never accepted to sell their ancestors' lands, so they hadn't been contacted. Keiichi's and Rena's fathers were known artists in their own fields, and they belonged to the middle class, just like the Sercos. His father, moreover, was taking care of Satoko and Satoshi, as foster parent. Namely, all their families wouldn't have needed a financial help, to survive, even if they had to abandon the village.

But besides them, there were other villagers, old men and women who had lived a simple existence until now, and who had feared to lose everything, so they had accepted the first offer they were given. And it was not only about them... there were several families who didn't like to live in that village. For them Hinamizawa was a place like every other one, if not worse, but they had not the money indispensable to leave. Keiichi knew about the past story of the Houjous, Satoko and Satoshi's real parents: hadn't they faced Oryou, during the Dam War? Their party was a minority, but they weren't alone. Poor and powerless inhabitants, who wanted to take the Government's money, in order to leave that group of stinking holes, move elsewhere and obtain a satisfying welfare. And after the Houjous had been punished, their party had seemed to vanish, but the real feelings of who was on their side had not disappeared, after all these years. And now...?

No, wait. The situation was even more critical. He had forgotten the Syndrome. If they had sold everything, they would be going to leave soon, or worst of all, they had already left. They would have been condemned, once they run into their first source of stress. He had to know it right now, but fortunately Kimiyoshi's answer relieved him:

"Ah, they should still be all in Hinamizawa, for now."

"All of them?"

"Yes. You know, it usually takes some day to organize yourself for a moving, you should be aware of it, you made this experience in the past. So, while they were arranging it, they had been informed that they were not really in danger, and they could stay here. It was then that they had come to me to talk about this issue, in that moment they had concluded something was the matter in this story. Formally they are not living in their houses anymore now, since they've sold it with a regular contract, but I hope everything will soon be fine for all of them, we'll not leave them alone."

Keiichi agreed with him, remembering his past period in Tokyo, and his move towards the village. He had to manage so many heavy boxes, that time, even if that tiring effort had not been the thing he was most worry about, in those remote days. While arranging it, he was still upset, because of what he had done to that small child, with that airsoft gun. After all, helping him to overtake that painful experience had been the reason which pushed his parents to leave Tokyo, and to go and live there...

No, it was not the moment to think about the past, there was a much more serious matter to handle, now. "So? What do they want to do, now?"

"Some of them has already dealt the number present on the business cards they got from those appointees, and they have already arranged a new appointment, to find a way to cancel the contracts. They'll go next week, I was told."

"So it seems it's all OK now, but why have you phoned me, then?"

"For multiple reasons. First of all, we must make sure that _every _person who has sold his goods manages to void his own contract, like these others. I don't think that the State will pay for something which is definitely going not to happen, so nobody has interest in going away from here without a cent; saying it in the next council will be enough. Then, I guess they'd like to have some lawyer next to them, to be sure they aren't risking to lose everything, somewhat: the ones the Sonozaki family normally avails of will be fine, to deal with these cases all together, and I hope that Mion-san won't disagree with us. Finally, this story teaches us that we must create some common guideline, this village has always been founded on the strength created by fighting all together, you know it very well."

"I see. Well, I'll pull some strings..." Kimiyoshi didn't answer. Keiichi, noticing it, asked him if there was something else.

"Ohh... you know... I've called you because... There is another reason, an irrational one, if you want to call it so. If these 300 villagers had been sent away, our effective strength would be lesser, and even now, after all this time, I fear that in Tokyo they still want to buy our valley to build that damn Dam. I know that they wouldn't do that, likely, going behind another time would become an embarrassing paradox, for them... But I need to feel we are as powerful as some year ago. Please support us, Maebara-sama, we all trust you."

_Maebara-sama... _Kimiyoshi was afraid of what was happening, it could be nothing but this. Oryou had protected the village for so much time, and now he feared not to be strong enough to replace her worthily. Therefore, he was looking for someone who could make it in place of him, and since Mion was angry with him, he applied for Keiichi, treating him with the maximum respect and deference. His young interlocutor realized this, and he was experiencing the heaviness of what this meant. However, he was not scared. _They all trust me... _The boy smiled, feeling like honored by such a responsibility. "Understood. Thanks for calling, Kimiyoshi-san."


	18. Like the old good days

**18 – Like the old good days**

_Hinamizawa, 8th December 1983_

The Principal was ringing the bell, to announce the end of another day of school. Mion stood up quickly, and, once arranged her schoolbag, she exited from the classroom, accompanied by Keiichi and Shion. She was not in a good mood, someone had phoned from the Manor, asking her to come back to home immediately after the end of the lesson. It was probably about something important. So, the three boys left rapidly the school, waving to nobody, and they got into the car which had been prepared for them, while their friends could do nothing but observing them from one of the big windows of the building. Satoko's and Rena's minds were recalling the old good days, when they were used to stay at school all together, and to wrestle each other during the various activities they decided to carry out. A happy life which seemed on the point of vanish forever.

"Our club has not met for so much time... Rena thinks that it's a real pity, it is."

"Laughing time is over, here. Gathering at school or elsewhere just to have fun would clash with their actual frame of mind... But I fear that our club has been definitely split up, even if not officially yet."

For Satoko this was very sad news. The club had been her lifeline, in the past, but now most of its older members were becoming adults, they were treated as such, and they were involved in a complex situation, hard to solve. Their younger friends still could become helpful, but this time the matter required an experience they couldn't have yet, and Satoko had realized it. It was frustrating, and this pushed her to comment the scenario by saying: "Anyways, it's a shame that Nii-Nii is not sage enough to give them good advices...", while looking annoyed at her brother, who was standing immobile by her.

"S-satoko... this is not nice to say..." he limited himself to rebut. But in reality, even if her remark was not nice, she had got a point. Satoshi was patient and attentive, but he had never been a resolute boy, ready to guide his friends and to solve the situation. Moreover, he had even played truant for more than a year, and he had been totally isolated from the outer world, on the score of his disease. Keiichi, and the others too, had grown up in that period, they had become more mature, Satoshi instead hadn't... Without forgetting that his long absence from school was a unfulfillable handicap: due to his actual lack of preparation, he would have never been able to pass his entrance exams, to go to University the following year. Even if, considering his past health conditions, just having a normal life was already a sort of miracle.

"Satoko-chan" Rena had answered, in the meanwhile "I don't agree with you, I think that our club still exists... Simply, some of us have to go away, far from us and from our activities, because their duties are calling them. But they are still our friends."

"Do you think so?"

Rena nodded. "This would have anyway been the last year for Mii-chan and Shii-chan, we were wise to this, weren't we? This is what happens during life, and school in particular. Old people go away, new young ones arrive. This is what growing up means... thanking for the help you were given, and doing the same with who comes after you. One day, when you'll be an older lady, you'll be the chief of the club, and you'll guide your younger friends."

"Do you think so?" asked Satoko again, full of pride this time. "The chief of this class... Wow!"

"Oh, sure... But keep in mind that, once everything is fine again, Mii-chan, Shii-chan and Keiichi-kun will come back to our club, and one of them will be the leader again, even if only for a short period."

"Oh ho ho ho, it's not a problem, I could challenge them, if necessary! There is no chance that Keiichi-san can be a match for me..."

Satoshi laughed. Seeing her sister so desirous to become the leader of the club amused him, even if he didn't realize why it was so important for her. He had been more than a year far from school, after all, and he wasn't a very warlike member of the club. So, in the last months its activities had been representing a way to spend pleasant time with his friends, but not something worthy in itself. At most, he was more interested in them in the past, before he had suffered from the Syndrome. In those days the activities of the club allowed Satoko to have nice afternoons, far from their uncles, and keeping it alive could have become a main priority... But now it had no real meaning for him, Teppei and his wife had been dead, and so he was considering the eventual dissolution of the club like a pity, but not like a tragedy, on the contrary of what Satoko was thinking. That's how Satoshi was made.

Teppei and his wife were not in being anymore, sure... And it was not strange that he could think about their deaths peacefully, just as if he had been completely unrelated to their relatives' end. Nobody had told him he was the one who had murdered her Aunt, yet, and he had forgotten everything about that, too. He was still under observation, he had recovered from the disease only a few time before, and Irie wanted to avoid him other disturbing experiences: besides that, telling Satoshi about what he had done under the effects of the Syndrome could remind Satoko that she had killed her parents... she was still too young. If they had remembered something they would have been told the truth, but otherwise the others would have waited at least for their adulthood, to talk about that subject.

Suddenly, Satoko noticed that Rena was going away. She asked her where she was wending.

"Oh, nothing special, Rena wants just to make for home. You know, it's going late and it's already quite dark, outside, so..."

"Yes, you're right, we should go too, there is nothing to do here. I should reach Rika, she had to stay home because she had to make an inventory of the outfit inside the Saiguden, as before every winter. Tsk, how can they allow her not to go to school even if she's not ill? That's not fair..."

Rena laughed for Satoko's exclamation, and then she greeted her brother and her, before starting to head towards home. The Sun had already set, and the sky was getting quickly dark. Going to the Dump for a little exploration would have been pointless, she couldn't have seen anything without a flashlight, and she had never been there by night.

_Never? Have I really never been there during the night? _She cast her mind back over a nightmare she had made some time ago. In that horrendous dream she wanted that man to die, that Teppei, that coward who had menaced her beloved father, some time before... Why didn't he just take back her lover Rina, instead of accusing him to have stolen her? Everyone would have been happier. And so, in that scaring dream she had been forced to lead him at the Dump with an excuse. And there she had attacked him by surprise with her nata, hitting him in the middle of his forehead and kil...

Rena removed these thoughts, shaking her head. That tragedy didn't happen really in this world, fortunately. To be honest, she had neither met Teppei, in real life, let alone she had seen him with her father. She just knew that her parent wanted to buy a house for his lover Rina, and that this could bring to a disaster, it would have been the first step towards the realization of that nightmare. If he had really purchased that apartment for her, Teppei would have appeared and then... Thankfully, asking Mion for some advice had been the move which let her face her difficulties successfully, without harming anyone. Suggested by her friend, Rena had asked her father to have a talk with her, and then she had clearly told him to stop behaving like a puppet in Rina's hands, and to react. Her father had given heed to her, and since that evening they had never seen that woman anymore.

Now they were happy, alone and far from that lover, and from her mother... Rena smiled, maybe during that period she really loved her father. She had felt in a harsh competition, and even Mom had been her enemy, as well as Rina. Those women were the ones who wanted to bring him away, far from her. And so, after Rina had been ousted, she was somewhat satisfied that Dad was again with her, with her and nobody else._ Yes, this was the truth... _Rena thought then about her mother, who had left her husband to live with another man. She even had announced to her that she had got pregnant, during their last meeting. But was it true, or was it only a cruel joke said by her mother to make a fool of her? Did that baby really exist? Had he been born? What was his name, or her name? Had they had other children? Were they happy?

Rena didn't know the answers of this questions, and sincerely she didn't want to know them, she never had met them after the end of her stay in Ibaraki. _Do what you please, just stay away from us... _Well, Rena couldn't deny it, her father had been her reason to live, during her adolescence, and she would have done everything for him, everything... Yes, probably in those months he had been like a husband for her. _How do they call it... __Electra complex? I must have read something about it._ Anyhow, even if that had been the truth, it had been only a juvenile fantasy, he was just her parent now, she had started to love someone else... another boy, more or less as aged as her, but now he... Rena sent away even that thought. She'd better go to home with someone else, next time, someone to talk with; otherwise that strange way of thinking would have begun to peep out too often.

But there was also another reason not to go alone. She turned her eyes behind her, looking at the rice fields. The sky above her head was getting dark, but there was still light enough to watch around, and it wouldn't have been easy for someone to follow her in that zone without being noticed, there were no trees, no houses, no poles large enough. Only some little scattered bush, and rice plants, obviously. It was not easy to shadow her, there... But it was not impossible, elsewhere. There were other zones in Hinamizawa where hiding was absolutely possible, and along the path from school to home there were isolated areas where they could organize an ambush, too...

She was thinking about the cuttings she had received, and the menacing message on the envelope. It was so ironical: in the past she was obsessed by the idea that Oyashiro-sama was following her everywhere, driving her next to craziness, and now there was another stalker, this time a normal human. But this didn't mean he was less dangerous than the Monk. _Yes, I should ask for someone to go to school and to home with me... but who? _Usually Keiichi would have been the best solution, but that was not the case, the Landslide Affair was keeping him busy, and she didn't want to make him even worrier; moreover, he didn't want to stay alone with a boy already engaged, she didn't find it fair. As for the others, Rika, Satoko and Satoshi lived on the other side of the village, and Shion and Mion were already busy as well. _Yes, I should ask Ali-chan and Gi-chan to accompany me, starting from tomorrow. They already know about the letter they have sent to me, they'll help me._ Sometimes they couldn't have gone with her, they would have been absent from school because of their job, but it didn't happen often, for now it would have been a satisfying solution.

Suddenly she raised her glance, and she found herself where she didn't imagine to be: "This is... Keiichi-kun's house. How have I ended here?" It was the strength of habit. Till a few days before, Rena was used to go every morning to his house, in order to walk to school with him, and afterwards with Mion and Shion too, after the twins joined them on the road. That was a path the girl knew so well, and she had gone through it without even noticing it, while she was lost in her thoughts. Embarrassed, she instantly decided to go back, but in that moment she saw a big black car next to the garage. It was the vehicle which was usually driven by Kasai, Rena was sure of it.

"This means that also Shii-chan and Mii-chan are here, probably. Rena wonders why have they come here, why are they here?"

She looked at the time. It was half past six, she had walked for more than two hours, without noticing it, lost within the meanders of her mind. It was getting late, as shown by the turned on street lamps, and she had to prepare dinner for her father and her... but she was just too curious. She went beyond the opened gate, and she rang the bell._ No, wait, what if they are arranging an official engagement, something they want to announce soon? I'd disturb them..._ It might have been possible, indeed, even in such a convulsive moment. Before marrying Mion, Keiichi would have been adopted by the Sonozaki family, in order to keep alive their family name. It would have been lost otherwise, Akane had had only two daughters, and neither a male son. _Maybe that's why Mii-chan sometimes wishes to be a male, she cares her familiar issues so much..._ It was not strange that they want him as new relative, anyway. He had been a so priceless help for the Sonozaki family, and having him next to her would have given to Mion a great strength to face every problem, now and for all her life. Rena knew her friend... In reality, she was not the invincible hoyden she pretended to be at school, she was such a fragile woman, and she needed help from someone able even to break the fate, especially now.

_Yes, they must be here for that reason, Rena can't stay here. _Asking Keiichi to stay at the Manor to help Mion had already been painful, with that suggestion she had renounced at him, and she had cried during the whole following night. Rena didn't want to hear them announcing their official engagement: she was happy for her friends, but she feared not to be able to block her tears, and she didn't want to let the others see she was suffering because of that. She thought to run away, but it was too late, someone was opening the door, after checking the guest's identity. It was Keiichi's mother, who kindly welcomed her and let her coming in, inviting the youth to come to the drawing room, where Rena met the people she knew she was about to find inside.

Shion asked her why she was there, and Rena answered that she had seen the car outside, and that she had thought there were news about the Affair. Mion then looked at Keiichi, asking him to tell what had happened. While saying it, she was massaging her forearm. Rena noticed it. It was... the zone where Satoshi had wounded her with his bite, that day at the basement of the Irie Clinic. After more than two months, there were still the signs of his teeth on it, even if they were slowly vanishing, hopefully without leaving any scar. That one had not been a painless hit, that evening she must have felt as grabbed by a hungry beast, fearing to see her whole arm torn. Seeing those marks each time she undressed couldn't be that pleasant, for her. At least, they were already in late autumn and winter was rapidly coming with its icy temperatures. She could start to wear long sleeved clothes, to hide them.

And moreover she had neither heard any apology for that. Satoshi, after coming back to a normal life, had been told nothing about this, he had forgotten everything and making him feel guilty was honestly unfair to him. The Syndrome was the one responsible for that aggression, he wasn't. But if he had asked her what had happened to her forearm, it would have been an atrocious hoax, just as if they were jeering her. _Poor Mii-chan... you have been so unlucky in the past, you've had to suffer... but now Keiichi-kun is by you, you're going to be happy..._ _  
_

"Rena?" Keiichi interrupted her reflections "Ehm... have you listened to what I've said?"

"Oh... no, sorry Keiichi-kun, sorry... Rena has not been a good girl, I know it... Could you repeat it, please?"

Keiichi sighed. "I've just asked you to take one of these sheets, and to read it."

Rena obeyed, and her finger pointed soon at the first line of the text written on the paper. "This is... a contract? One of those you were telling us yesterday, am I right?"

"Yes. By signing one of these, you renounce to all your goods in Hinamizawa, in lieu of a money refund. All the concluded agreements have been registered, so we got some precise info. Can you imagine how many of these have been presented to the competent offices?"

Rena shook her head, worried by the possible answer, which quickly arrived: "It's about 126 contracts. And they involve 534 inhabitants, more than the 25% of the whole population of the village."

"So many villagers?"

"Yes. Please keep in mind that quite a lot of houses are lived by more than one family, and that in other ones there are old couples who still live together with their sons' families. A single pact often concerns six-seven individuals."

"I see... You know, I live alone with Dad, so Rena had forgotten this... But, now... what will they do? Are they going to move away?"

"I fear so, and they won't be happy to do that." He took another sheet of paper, coming from a law firm. "This is a little informal report by one of Mion's cousins, a lawyer. Yesterday he was sent the copies of some of the signed contracts, and he gave a look at them. You can read yourself what his answer has been."

Rena took the letter, and while reading she started to move her finger along the contract she had in front of her. Finally she found the line she was looking for. A little marginal note next to the end of the text, written with a very little font: "..._In case the risk due to the friability of the soil is revealed as unfounded, or not sufficiently elevated, the correspondent indemnity for the sale of the signatory's properties will be reduced by an amount equal to the 69% of the sum agreed above..._ No, that's impossible!"

"It's possible, instead. Since we claimed the study is a fake and there is no danger here, our friends are about to be paid less than a third of what they were presuming, and after that they'll be forced to go away from Hinamizawa."

"But this is a fraud. It's nothing but a fraud!"

"You're right, but they have signed it, and by doing it they have declared to have read it entirely, and then to accept this note too. However, as you have just said, this is not a fair agreement, and we'll fight against it."

"But why has a public institute..."

"The _Japanese Office for Services on the Territory_, are you saying?" He pointed at its name on the contract Rena was still holding "Oh, well... we had asked our lawyer to check this, too... And there is not a public society with that name. That is a private group, created not a lot of time ago, with a name which could easily deceive who had to sign this agreement."

"And who is its owner? There must be someone who controls it..."

"We don't know. It's a society created with assets coming from abroad, and formally controlled not by a person in flesh and blood, but by other similar companies, managed in turn by other holdings, and all the rest of it... It's a process quite complicated, even only to be explained, I'm not sure to have fully understood how it works, too. However, we are investigating that net, to find who pulls the strings of it, but it will take time, they likely have created that system not to be discovered, indeed. They probably have even employed people from other cities, when they had to find someone who had to go through the village to sign all those agreements. We have asked the signers for some facial composite, and we've already brought it to the police station, but I fear that such an organized fraud availed also of prepared accomplices, hard to search out after the whole operation. Some delinquent who is specialized in this kind of crimes, I mean."

"But, so, in the meanwhile... will they have to move away... and... " Rena didn't finish the sentence. Kasai and Keiichi's parents were in the room, too.

"Rena, are you afraid of the Syndrome, am I right?"

Rena gazed at Keiichi, surprised, but Shion intervened to clear her doubts. "Don't worry. They already know about it... in this moment we must look for help also from the adults we trust more. But they can't give us good advice, if they aren't aware of the whole matter, don't you agree? Also my parents have been told everything, but apart from them nobody else does. We didn't become that gabby, all of a sudden. And sure I didn't omit to ask them not to reveal it to anyone, and I'm sure they're listening to me."

"I see... So, what are you planning to do?"

"Well, the agreement doesn't come into effect before the end of the month when they've signed and registered it, they have written it on all the contracts, so we have more than three weeks to organize something. We've already contacted the police, and informed the prefect, namely one of Mion's uncles, who has suggested us to gather all the involved people, and to go to his palace, to show publicly the importance and the size of this fraud, and to claim for justice more efficiently. But we will make something bigger. This is not an act against only a person, this is an act against the whole village, and the whole village will answer properly. We'll show to everyone that we won't accept to be decimated that way, and that we are not alone! They will come from Okinomiya too, I can't be wrong about it!"

"Have you understood, Rena-chan?" exclaimed Mion, finally smiling, excited "_If one person is struck, two shall strike back; if stones are thrown at two people, four will throw stones back..._ This is the Hinamizawa Spirit, and we are going to dust the periods when we had been able to change the destiny of the village, like during the Dam War. We are ready to face them, and I hope everyone will do so." Mion had never talked, after Rena's coming, but the decision Keiichi and she had taken had reminded her of what her grandmother and the other chiefs of the village had done. The boy's brave words had set fire to her heart, and in that moment she felt worthy of them, worthy of her ancestors.

Rena nodded, convinced and relieved, thanks to her friend's behavior. "Yes, we must do something strong, but not outside the law... When are you going to realize this giant demonstration?"

"Oh, it will be very soon, that's why we are here, and not at our house!" answered Shion "Kei-chan will phone to friends, schoolmates, Angel Mort's subordinates, known people, unknown people, everyone namely! He has to convince them, and he will have pass a lot of time with that receiver next to his ear. Unluckily our house has only a telephone line, and we need it for important communications and news. Ah, Onee, you should modernize that old mansion, you must be in step with the times..."

"Oh, it's OK for me, but I'm using your weekly pocket money, sure!"

"You, cruel monster! How dare you saying this cruelties to your little beloved sister!"

Mion and Shion were comforted, while hearing themselves saying so. They still were good sister, who wanted to help eachother. And since they were the old good sisters they had always been, they started quarreling animatedly, tugging eachother's hair while the others were trying to divide them.

…

While Keiichi was finishing to explain all the details to Rena, from his Clinic Irie-sensei had asked Rika to come for some new discovery about the ATPC, and the little girl joined him in the evening, after dinner. Rika was used to such meetings, they happened often, especially after the finding of that protein, but this time was different. The Landslide Affair was involving the whole village, everyone was focused on it, and if Irie had decided to make her turn her attention to something different, that was due to an extremely important reason. In fact, the medic quickly took a handwritten graph, and he showed it to her, troubled. Rika read the title: _"ATPC Values inside Sonozaki Mion's blood. _ What does this mean?_"_

"You can see it, Rika-chan. This graph is a summary of the quantity of that protein we found in her blood. You know, we are having some difficulties to synthesize it, so we had to collect some new sample, from time to time, even to understand what went wrong in our experiments. The first one dates back the day after her promotion as chief of her family, the following ones have been made each ten days, can you see them? Of course, we are talking about very small quantities of blood, slightly more than the size of a syringe. Larger samples could become dangerous, if made at a so close range. However..."

"However?"

"You can see the trend of this graph, can't you?" Rika observed it. As it was going from the left to the right, the line which showed the value of ATPC went up and up.

"So, in these last days the level of the protein in her blood has increased greatly... so, what's its meaning?"

"Rika-chan, there is no substance in this world which doesn't hurt the human body, if present in excessive quantity. Even vitamins, which are necessary for you, can lead you to terrible diseases: you can bump into liver and kidney problems, and also your nervous system can be damaged. This matter is true for every substance, and the ATPC can't be an exception."

"So are you saying that the most recent level is too high?"

"No, not for now. This concentration is still lower than Satoshi-kun's one, when we had found the ATPC for the first time. But that was a particular case, a patient who was suffering from L5 of the Syndrome. And there's not a big difference between the two levels by now, this trend is something which doesn't allow me to stay calm about her health." Rika nodded, comprehending the cause of Irie's uneasiness, then the doctor went on: "The quantity of the protein inside her grandmother's blood was similar to the one we found in Mion's one with the first surveys, so I'd say that is the _"normal"_ level, for all I can say with such a little global sample. The following analyses, instead, aren't saying anything good, I fear."

"What might... the consequences be, Irie?"

"I don't know, this is a still unknown substance. We can only reason about what had happened at Satoshi-kun, that evening down at the basement."

Rika invited him to keep on speaking: "Do you remember when I've talked about the predator-prey system? The level of ATPC is that high because there are a lot of parasites inside the nervous system, and likely_ only_ because of that. That really seems like an antibody to me, which reacts only at that kind of intruders, so I'd exclude other external causes for now. So, what can increase the number of parasites? Basically factors of stress, under certain conditions, like being far from the Queen Carrier and so on. In Satoshi-kun's case, the factor of stress was the presence of their uncles in their house, but once they were no more alive, this factor itself had disappeared. Hence, after the ATPC had been able to kill the already formed parasites, Satoshi-kun was fine again, and the protein had slowly vanished too, since it was like a starving predator couldn't find any other prey to eat. In Mion-san's case, instead, there must be a factor which brings a constant stress to her, and one of long duration."

"Her role as ruler of her family?"

"Maybe. Keep in mind that Oryou-sama carried a lower quantity of ATPC into her blood, but this can differ from person to person, it might be subjective. Perhaps this issue about landslides can be a reason too, it's becoming a serious crisis. Indeed, this is a factor of strain which still exists, on the contrary of Satoshi-kun's one. Namely, the protein inside her is trying to kill the parasites in her brain, but other new ones come because of her state of stress."

"There is a sort of war inside her brain, then, I've realized why you're worried now... But so are you saying that Mii-chan would have been going to reach the final levels of the Syndrome, without the protein? It's strange... she has never gone far from Hinamizawa, as far as I'm aware."

"You're wrong. Don't you remember that just some day ago she went to Nagoya to contact the builders of those condominiums? When we all thought we had to leave the village forever, because of the incoming giant landslides? She had gone there alone as chief of her family, while Maebara-san had stayed at her Manor, to keep the situation under control. But she had come back only after..." Irie made mentally calculation "After a day and a half, there had been some hitch during the stay and the trip. And even only leaving the village and the surrounding cities for 36 hours is enough, you should know it."

Irie was right. Once they were all in Hinamizawa, or also in Okinomiya, they risked nothing, but Nagoya was too far, the healing hormones she produced as Queen Carrier didn't reach that city, and staying without them even for a very short period could bring to a mortal fatality. It was just like going underwater without an oxygen tank, only some second too many is enough to cause a tragedy... Rika had already faced it. Irie's words reminded to her all the worlds where Keiichi had stayed for a couple of days far from them, at his relatives' house. Just a couple of days, not more. And, in spite of the shortness of his absence, when he had come back the Syndrome had fogged his mind, making him not trust his friends anymore, or driving him to kill Teppei to save Satoko... None of those worlds had ended well. And now, she might have made the same mistake. Rika had lowered her guard, she thought Mion would have been safe, thanks to the ATPC, so she had forgotten that important detail, but now... what might happen to her?

No, maybe she was becoming neurotic now, as some time before towards Giancarlo. She shouldn't always look for the worst scenarios, the doctor had said that Mion _can't_ suffer from the Syndrome, she will never lose her mind. Recovering her self-control, Rika asked Irie what to do.

"We can't tell her to take some day of rest. It would be useless. Even if we forced her to stay in bed she'd go on thinking about the other people of her village, about their problems... That factor of stress wouldn't disappear. All we can do is helping her, making her feel at ease, to keep her as far as possible from each source of stress. And hoping that this story ends quickly."

Irie looked at Rika, when he finished speaking. She seemed sad, and thoughtful: "I'm sorry to have told you these bad news. I can't be even sure of this, maybe she won't have any problem. But I've seen this data, this level of ATPC so similar to Satoshi-kun's one... I wanted to be sure she won't run any risk. Obviously, I will give this same advice also to the rest of your club, they all have to support her, as it's normal, in this period."

"Don't worry, Irie, you've made the right choice, I agree about the importance of not leaving her life up to fate. I'll be ready, we all will be ready. But now I was thinking about something else you've said before..."

The medic asked what she was referring to, puzzled, and Rika replied: "Irie, a minute ago you've said that the ATPC in Oryou-sama's blood was not that present as inside Mii-chan's one, and that it was a subjective element. For example, it could mean Oryou-sama suffered from less stress, that she was more able to deal with it, and that she didn't need to have recourse to the protein as much as her granddaughter."

"It's possible... but what do you mean?"

"Well... let's say it in this way..._ I wonder if Mii-chan is really ready to be the chief of the village_..."

* * *

**Author's note: phew, trying to be exact about the Syndrome is not easy, in the original story they are so vague, and they claimed that it is caused by an airborne pathogen, which simply doesn't work (Irie & Co. simply could analyze the air, instead of opening the others' brains...). It would have been simpler and more effecting to describe something similar to the AIDS (which was raising in the 80s, indeed, it would have been a nice analogy). **


	19. TIP: Forgotten Worlds III

**TIP: Forgotten Worlds III**

This little old van is so useful, I wonder why they have thrown it away, here at the Dump. When it's rainy, outside, it's the perfect place to stay alone, sheltered from the falling water. And even this afternoon, with this bad weather, it's a so nice refuge. Nobody will ever find me here, I can think about everything I want, without being disturbed.

I look at my left hand. It's not clean at all. Its dark fingers are all covered with little scratches and blood. Well, it's not strange. Those damn maggots... I had tried to remove as many of them as possible, before... My neck still hurts, but it was worth doing it, now I'm feeling better. But for how much time? They will come back. What can I do, then? I can't break my fingernails in this way, I must search for a better solution. I must read carefully the notebooks I was given by Takano-san. Oh, but I have time for that, later.

Now I look at my right hand, which is still holding a document, coming from Irie-sensei. In the last days I was suffering from nausea, I wasn't able to sleep, I have even vomited twice. Hardly ever it could be a flu, so... suddenly a suspicion had come into my mind, and I've asked the sensei for help. I've made a little and simple exam, and the result was what I was expecting. Irie was not prepared to it, instead, it was not the first time he had to announce it, but it was likely the first time he was not happy of it.

I am pregnant.

Poor Dad, I don't know how he will react to these pieces of news. He lives alone with his only daughter, and suddenly she tells him she's waiting for a baby. Maybe they'll divide us, and I'll be fostered with my mother's family. No, I can't allow it. Rather than going there, I'm killing that bitch. After all, she wouldn't be the first one. Rina and Teppei have already anticipated her, and now they are over there, hidden by me and my friends. I hope nobody will ever find their corpses, they could bring me to jail, far from Dad...

But now? Should I go to home? There's no rain now, I could go out from this van... No, I want to stay here a bit more. This is a lonely place, calm and quiet. I don't want adventures, I don't need them. I'd like that my days are all the same, even boring and monotones if necessary, but peaceful, far from the dangers, and the problems of life. Wouldn't it be wonderful if you have not to face either a real problem, in your whole life? I don't want to be a heroine, I just want to be happy everyday, with my Dad, and my friends. I don't want that something, or somebody, destroys my little world, my personal heaven.

Now it's late, I can't stay here anymore. I have to go home. Let's close all the doors of the van, I wouldn't like that a thief comes in and takes what I've left inside. I know, maybe that's just ridiculous, but I'm used to follow my routine. I always do so at home, there's no reason why I shouldn't do the same here. Let's go, now.

While walking, I read again the sheet of paper Irie has given me. What will Dad say, when I tell him I'm pregnant? He will be shocked. His dear daughter... Oh, Dad, don't worry, it has been a choice of mine. I can understand you still are a male, that's why you had fallen in love with that woman, am I wrong? Rina is no more on this Earth, now, she will never be with you, but maybe you might have guessed you needed someone else, and you would have searched for another lover, similar to her. She would have become a danger for him, she could have destroyed my family... But after all, there was already a girl in your house. I was already by you, you knew it. I didn't want you to suffer again, you have already cried enough, after the divorce. You are my father, my family, my man... you are my world.

It will be curious, I know... A baby will be born, and Dad will be his grandfather, but at the same time he will be his father, too. What if he gets scary about the others' reaction... Well, it's not someone who usually cares about it, but if he wants so we'll just tell some lie, nobody will die because of that. And you have not to regret for it, you had claimed not to want to do this, that night, but after all you are just a man, and once we were near enough there was nothing you could really do to avoid this, it didn't matter how much you had shouted. Haven't I told you _I love you_ so many times, in the past and even now? And haven't you done it, too? It's not strange, it's something absolutely normal.

But... Will he think so, after all? Will he still want to live to me, now? What will happen, if he starts considering me a mad girl, and this baby an abomination? If he sends me away, suddenly, because he thinks I am a monster, and nothing else? I couldn't bear with this. Dad, you can't deny our existence, we are here, you know it.

And finally, can we even think to be the only one with this destiny? Is it really possible that there is nobody else who is hiding some terrible secret? I can't believe it. Look at the others, look at my friends... How many secrets are they hiding? For example, Mii-chan and Shii-chan are so similar to their mother, but their father and them have nothing in common... How can we be sure that he's really their father? Akane-san could absolutely have had a lover, and she might have him even nowadays.

About Keiichi-kun, instead... well, I don't even need to say anything about him. Oishi-san has informed me about his past incidents, I can't have any doubt in his case. And during the last days he claimed to be ready to help me, like a pure superhero. And Satoko-chan? She is a pariah, she belongs to the Houjou family, they wanted all of us to drown, and in fact now everybody hates her. She must carry the marks of Evil on her soul, she wouldn't be treated so bad, otherwise.

Yes, I can see it finally. That school, that building where we thought to be happy... is just a lair full of Demons, a place where the sons of pity live, grow up and ignore their condition, claiming to be normal boys. They are not normal boys, forget that absurd pretense. You are monsters, and you'd like to claim I am worse than you? That this baby should never come into light? It can't be, you are nothing but soulless wretches.

Yes, there is only a solution. This place is damned, the whole Hinamizawa is cursed. But to wipe these monsters out of the face of the Earth, I must erase the youngest ones, the ones who are supposed to live for a longer time. I know what to do, I know about some gas can stored in a place where nobody ever goes. Nobody will notice it, if I take some of them.

This night, after that Dad has gone to bed, I'll start my preparations. Tomorrow, the great Fire of Purification will clean every trace of evilness from this cursed land, and it will save this whole world.

Dad, please wait for us.


	20. Cicadas and moths

**20 – Cicadas and Moths**

_Okinomiya, 18th December 1983_

Sunny days, in winter, are the coldest of the whole year. During nights, the absence of clouds forbids the Earth to keep the little warmth given by the weak Sun of the period, like a man who goes to bed with no covers. Moreover, if in the morning you pass by a wood and the night before has been cold enough, you can see all the trees iced, their branches covered by thin and delicate stalactites. If those plants hadn't been ready to this period, letting their leaves fall and getting rid of all the water they can do without, they would have instantly killed by that charming coldness. In order to survive, Nature freezes, in this period, and so it did even not far from Hinamizawa.

Walking early in the morning, with that weather, wouldn't have been pleasant for anyone, but fortunately they have invented cars. So, while his sister was driving them to Okinomiya, Giancarlo could comfortably look through the glass at the panorama, sat on the back seat. The Sun was still hidden behind the mountains, but its light was starting to illuminate the whole surrounding world, allowing him to see how cold the previous night had been. _I hope not to slide because of ice, in Okinomiya... It's so early, roads will be so slippery, even simply walking won't be completely safe. But the real problem will be waiting for more than an hour outside with this temperature, once we are there..._

But they couldn't do differently. Even if it was Sunday, Flavia had to go to work, after having driven them to the city, and afterwards she needed the car, as usual. They were lucky she had spent the previous night at their house, allowing them to have a driver and a car to use. The alternatives would have been to ask someone else for a lift, or, even worse, to go from Hinamizawa to Okinomiya by bike. His body wouldn't have been able to face that effort, after that there would have been no chance to avoid a bad pneumonia, for him and for his sister Alice as well.

Moreover, was it really necessary? Had he really to go to Okinomiya, with all the others? What could he do, there? He was told about the Dam War, when more than a thousand people manifested. Their strength, and their bravery, had led them to victory, and they were able to save their hometown. Now his family was going to join the other inhabitants of the village, to support who had sold his goods to those group of crooks, being deceived by them. They would have fought together... but would he have been so useful? He never had been a leader, he wasn't brave enough, he was just a further unit in an already large group. It wouldn't have made a big difference, being a crowd made of 2001 people, rather than one of 2000 people.

_Alice is different from me, she can even become decisive. She's able to strengthen the others, she likes to involve them into the action. She is not scared of finding herself in large groups, and she often becomes their leader. She's so enthusiast, when she does something which she thinks is the right thing to do. I know that very well... She has been the one who convinced me to join Flavia and her in Hinamizawa, I would have stayed at home, otherwise. In my case, instead... there is no difference between me and a wooden statue. I could have asked Rena to bring there Kenta-kun, it would have been more useful than me._

Maybe this kind of bleak thoughts was inspired by the weather outside. They had nearly reached Okinomiya, and its countryside was covered by a dense fog. No bikes or pedestrian were showing up, it was Sunday, and a cold one; the city was gloomy and quiet, suggesting a backing sense of melancholy. Nobody inside the car was talking, so his mind could go on working, without being disturbed. Until someone spoke: "I've never been in a big demonstration, I hope everything will be fine."

Giancarlo looked then at the front seats. Alice, from there, couldn't hide her state of excitement, while Flavia, who was driving, limited herself to a smile.

"Is this a real fear or just a platitude, Nee-chan? We always hope for our life to be nice, unless you are a masochist or a person who reasons in a strangely twisted way."

"Nii-chan, next Sunday will be Christmas Day, can't you be me more gentle at least now? It was just a way to break the ice, it was so noiseless here..."

"It wasn't my will to be rude... But this kind of sentence is always so meaningless, you know."

"And what should we talk about, then? We even have a guest here!"

Alice pointed at her brother's left, where Rena was sat. She instantly blushed: "Rena doesn't want to be a nuisance. You haven't to behave differently just because of me..."

The Italian girl answered laughing: "Oh, don't worry, we are just joking. It's something we are used to, and Nii-chan is not angry at all, he's just feigning so. Moreover you were looking for someone who could drive you there, we couldn't leave you to your own destiny." Her father had passed the night in Okinomiya, after being called urgently by the tailoring he usually drew his clothes for, and leaving her alone was not very safe, after the menacing message she had received, so Alice had offered her to stay at their home for the night.

It was not the first time for Rena, to come to their house. Alice, after all, was extremely kind with her, she wanted her to become a close friend of her family. She was trying to make her feeling as if she was at her own home, and she was involving Giancarlo in it as much as possible. That morning, moreover, she had sat on the front seat, which was unusual for her. She had chosen so to force her brother to stay next to Rena, and now she wanted to avoid that dangerous silence. Alice wanted them to begin to talk with each other, to get to know one another, and she was bending over backwards to reach this goal, animated by a secret hope. _She would be a wonderful girlfriend for him, and now that Keiichi is engaged with Mion... If they start taking a liking to each other..._

Her brother sighed: "OK, OK, so, what should we talk about? About these fellows we are looking for? It would be interesting, even because we have just in front of us the responsible of the inquiry they are probably going to start."

"What should I answer?" exclaimed Flavia "At the moment I don't know much more than you, they've made a formal denunciation only two days ago, and the prefect has personally asked me to wait for after today's demonstration, to start the procedure. Well, after all I wouldn't have a lot to use for now, there had been a couple of matches between our databases and the four facial composites brought us by the Sonozakis, but they are some criminals coming from Tokyo. I bet a coffee than they've gone back there, that's why we've sent our minutes to the officers operating in that city, but in the meanwhile we can't do much more. Well, all those villagers will have to wait, but that's just what they have done too, until now, so I hope they won't complain about it."

In fact, some day before, the lawyers engaged by the Sonozaki family had been ensured by the Japanese Office for Services on the Territory, or more simply the JOST, the group which had signed all those contracts. They had claimed they would have taken care of everything, so the villagers were suggested to wait for the meeting they had already arranged by phone. But no one from that society came to it, so the inhabitants of the village went immediately to the police station to denounce them.

"And those fools were lawyers, indeed!" commented Alice "How could be they so naïve to trust them?"

"Rena knows why, Shii-chan has told me!" she answered "They were sure about the fear which could be inspired by the Sonozaki family itself, and by the Hinamizawa's Spirit. You know, fighting again as during the Dam War, or bringing charges against them, can become so long, and expensive. They hoped in a simpler solution, they thought that also our opponents would have had a lot to lose, if they had challenged us."

Alice nodded "I see. So why have they done this fraud in this way? It has no sense, Mii-chan's family is incredibly powerful and important, they won't leave them unpunished. And our village has strenuously fought during the past years, they should already know what they are running into." Rena smiled, hearing Alice saying _our village_. She was happy her friend had settled in so well.

"It's strange, indeed." said Flavia "Theirs was a very detailed plan, for sure. It's enough to look at the contracts, to realize it. They made the villagers sign agreements where the price of their lands decreased once the danger about landslides had disappeared. They didn't add that footnote by chance, they had known since the beginning there was no risk about it, which means that expert had been their accomplice for sure. But that's not all: they were also sure we would have discovered that this danger was unreal, otherwise they would have been asked the full price by the inhabitants, and they wouldn't have obtained that fraudulent discount."

"Then, if we hadn't found it alone... Are you saying they were going to make us aware of it, somehow?" asked Alice.

"I think so. I've already said that expert was working for them, haven't I? Once reached Christmas period, more or less, he was probably supposed to tell us something like _Ooops, sorry, I was wrong..._ and we would have had too few days for a proper reaction. At least this is a hypothesis of mine, but it's the most reasonable one, in my opinion. This theory also explains the expert's escape... He did it with no hitch at all, and that was because his break had already been planned, he would have run away anyway and our discovery had only obliged him to bring it forward. Of course, I hope he has just escaped, but there are worse chances, you can guess which ones."

"Yes, his accomplices might have decided to get rid of him, to prevent a dangerous witness from opening his mouth..." Rena whispered slowly, unsettled by that macabre theory.

Alice didn't like that outlook and she preferred to skip the subject. Then she asked: "So, for you, we were lucky, since we've discovered it before than what they thought... They weren't expecting this hindrance. But from their point of view, shouldn't they think about a countermeasure, in this case? They surely don't intend to be sitting ducks."

"You're right, Alice... I think we will find it soon. You've heard how they had tried to arrange a false meeting with the villagers, when they had been unmasked, and how they had deceived them again by not taking part in it. They wanted to gain time, to be ready to face this incoming fight. It won't be easy."

That was not a nice prospect, so the others kept silence. Then Rena asked "But is it legal, is it? Could they come to their houses, claiming that all their goods belong to them now, and sending them away?"

"It is legal, I fear, they have signed a formal agreement, after all. But the issue whether they are fair contracts or not is something completely different, and probably the Sonozakis will try to cancel them, this will probably their guideline. The JOST is probably a rich and powerful society, and for a single villager it would be impossible to fight against them. But if all of them stay together, and they make it be common knowledge so showily... It will be a serious problem for that group, because all the media will be against them, and they're going to do nothing but surrender, hopefully soon enough."

While listening to Flavia's answer, Rena looked at the boy sat next to her. Giancarlo was looking again outside, apparently uninterested. She asked him what he was thinking about.

"No, it's just... Strange. The ones who had bought all those houses knew where to go, they had chosen proper targets. They must know a lot about Hinamizawa, and about its past. And in spite of this, they attack the village so directly? Even if their plan had been successful, the fraud would have been discovered in the last days of the year, and so they were about to face the inhabitants' reaction, which maybe would have been even more violent, because of the few time they would have had. Namely, in every case, whether their original plan has been successful or it hasn't, they will have to face Hinamizawa's Spirit. So, there _must _be a reason which lets them think it won't harm them."

"Something which can neutralize it?"

"Or someone. Our real opponents could be... someone much more important than the Sonozaki family."

Flavia swallowed, while her brother went on. "The Sonozakis are powerful, I don't deny it for sure, but they are only represent only a "local strength", let's call them in this way. They have never been interested in anything outside this zone of the Country, after all this choice reflected their view of the world, and all the Hinamizawans' one too. This has been their strength, together with the other Great Families they have always had a complete control of their territory; but it's also their greatest weakness, their real power is not so big as it could have been, and surely lower than the one of other families and persons in Japan."

"Without forgetting the JOST is an international society, which could be even stronger than this." Giancarlo nodded, hearing Rena's worried note, and Alice gazed at the two youths sat on the back seats.

The boy's point of view was completely different from her sister's one. Alice considered that village as her second hometown, her brother instead was still thinking about himself as a guest, talking about the _Hinamizawans _as they were a group he didn't belong to. Essentially, this was due to their characters, and to their future life: Giancarlo, the following summer, would have gone back to Italy, at home he had a role he couldn't ignore, while Alice was free, and she appreciated more the spirit shown by those people, she felt at ease with them. If she wanted to, maybe in the future she was even going to decide to stay there forever, after asking her boyfriend to join her.

Anyways, both of the twins were surprised, when after a moment they saw Rena smiling, and saying: "Rena knows this we are not going to a party. But Rena is sure we will do it even this time. We should be more optimistic, sometimes, because, you know... Oyashiro-sama is with us, now."

The Sercos looked at her, curious. But Alice was smiling: "Yes, that's it. Nii-chan's thoughts are so often dark, and pessimistic. He'd really need a person able to see the lighter side of things!"

Flavia then commented ironically: "Well, that would be a nice story. However, we'd better stop here, if we go further we'll find everything blocked by your demonstration. So, get out of the car, and good luck, to you and to the others too."

They obeyed to her, and they started walking towards the square where they had to meet the others. It would have taken a dozen of minutes to them, so there was time to talk about something else. Alice's elbow hit her brother's back, to encourage him, until he finally asked: "Rena-chan... please stay next to us, until we reach the others. You know, that idiot who has sent you that letter has apparently vanished after that, but we must be sure of that. This demonstration can become a source of danger, for you. So stay next to us, or at least to some of the members of the club."

What he had said was making sense. The usage of the name _Reina_ into the letter suggested that its author was more likely from Ibaraki, rather than from Hinamizawa or Okinomiya, so he was far from there. But they had found no suspected fingerprints on the envelope, and the message inside it had been written with capital letters; hence, any calligraphic exam would have been useless, and so they couldn't identify the sender. They couldn't exclude he lived near to her... Even if that person hadn't sent any other message, nor he had tried to contact her anyhow, and moreover the inspectors from Ibaraki hadn't turned up anymore, after questioning her a first time. Maybe that had been only a bad joke.

"But we can't lower our guard, I'd say" said Alice "So, for today Nii-chan will be your Charming Prince..."

"Maybe Black Prince would suit me more." her brother answered, pointing at his own jacket and pants. Rena laughed, amused.

"So Rena should be a Green Princess, then, should she?"

"Well, maybe... and if we follow this logic Onee would be a Blue Queen, then." They turned their eyes behind them, looking at who had spoken. Shion, Satoshi and Satoko were there, and they were approaching their friends.

"Blue, are you saying?" answered Alice "Hmm, I'm expecting a wonderful and expensive dress, this is a special day."

"Indeed. It's one of those incredibly labored kimonos, full of decors and such stuff. She has shut herself off in her room for hours, together just with Mommy and me, to get dressed and to comb her hair. It matters a lot to her that everything is perfect, and so Kei-chan has been prepared properly, too. This is going to be a show, mostly, a way to argue the strength of the Sonozaki family." Shion, on the contrary of her sibling, was wearing an ordinary dark gray coat. She was not the chief of her clan, and that morning she didn't intend to be the center of attention. This was her sister's day, not hers.

Hence, Rena asked what was to be the schedule, and Satoko answered: "Oh, we're going to start from Yumizuka Square, as you already knew, and then we're going to follow this path." she showed her a sheet of paper with a short list of roads and a simple scheme of their arranged journey. "There will be some police officer along the way, just to grant everybody's safety, and to show to the others this is a non-violent demonstration, allowed by the authorities. Once we've reached the prefecture, we're about to wait for half an hour, before attending the show of who governs the building, namely the prefect, who is known also as Mion-san's uncle. Keiichi-san will explain to him the whole situation in a loud voice..."

"Even if the prefect already knows all?" asked Alice.

"Yes, you know, they had told him the issue only informally, and instead we must perform also an official act, to give more strength and name to our side. Things like this have a great impact on the public eye... You're going to see it, Keiichi-san will look like a famous speaker, and after he finishes to describe our problem the prefect will answer he will take care of it, while the others are clapping and hailing their leaders. Of course, someone could notice that the two protagonists will be relatives, in the future, but this won't have a significant importance, once our requests are accepted and everyone sees they are licit. Everything has been settled, as you can see, it's not going to be that hard. We even might be back at home before lunch, maybe."

_But is this a protest march or a farce?_ thought Giancarlo, while he heard his sister commenting "You're exaggerating, now, you are even looking like getting a big head... We're going to leave from the square at nine o' clock, and the march to reach the prefecture won't last less than two hours."

"I am not lying, Ali-chan. The prefect is supposed to show himself up at midday, more or less, so we might be again at Hinamizawa even at 2:00 PM. Well, of course, if you prefer so we can stay in Okinomiya the whole day, to celebrate our success. It's a sunny morning, and this low temperature will be raised very very quickly."

"Aren't you thinking it's that easy? You're talking about it as if it has already ended well..."

"Ah, man of little faith, let's turn right at the next crossroad, and you'll see our strength."

They do as she had suggested, and they looked at the scene, shocked. A giant crowd was already there, before their eyes, and the whole square itself could hardly contain all of them. Young people, senior citizens, housewives, workers... The whole Hinamizawa looked to be there.

"The whole Hinamizawa, are you saying? Oh, no, no." exclaimed Shion. "There is not only Hinamizawa here. Inside this crowd you can find a lot of people from Okinomiya, and someone from other villages around here, too. Onee and Kei-chan have already made some calculation, in the end there are going to be 8.000 participants, more or less."

Eight thousands... It was a huge number, indeed, especially because that zone had no big cities, full of people who could be gathered. Alice looked at her watch. There were 40 minutes left, before the beginning of the march, but they were all already there. And the atmosphere was so joyful and quiet. From the corner of the square, they could see some of their friends. Not far from them, they saw Irie and Takano, who was unusually smiling; maybe it was the first time that the Sercos were seeing her so happy. Next to her, a tall and muscled man, looking slightly older than her. He was wearing glasses, but he didn't look an egghead at all, he was likely used to go more to gymnasiums rather than to libraries. _Maybe he is her boyfriend, but I've never seen him in Hinamizawa. Who might he be, then?_ She heard Irie calling him _Tomitake-san. _

"Are you looking at him, Ali-chan?" said Shion. Alice nodded, asking for his identity. "Well... He's a sort of soldier, at least this is what Onee had told me. Takano-san and him are very close friends, probably we'd be right if we told they are engaged, but they have never declared it explicitly. I'd guess that's because he has to stay far from here on the score of his job, and Takano-san can't follow him because of her state of health. Once she recovers... well, who knows, this story could become very interesting. But for now, he just comes to Hinamizawa each time he's allowed to, to see her."

"I see..." when her brother and she were told about the Syndrome and the big fight against the Yamainu, she was informed about the existence of a man called so, even if she didn't know how he looked like. So she didn't ask more about him. _Probably he had been vaccinated as we had, that's why he can't enter and exit from the village freely._

Then she observed another group of people. Satoshi and Satoko were talking with some woman, peacefully and friendly. They were villagers from Hinamizawa too, Alice knew them, but they were kind with the two youths, in spite of their surname, and of what it meant in the past: suddenly they even began to laugh genuinely. So the Italian girl looked then at Shion, who was watching that same scene, smiling happily. _Now I understand, this demonstration is not only of use to the Sonozakis, to show their greatness. They've realized it even to strengthen the bonds within the village, between the various inhabitants. The Houjous are happy, accepted by their community again; Takano is happy, because today she can meet Tomitake... This is a way to recall the old good days, and to travel again through the steps they had made in that time._ But while concluding this, Shion grabbed her arm, saying to follow her.

"I've understood... but hey, wait a second, where is Nii-chan, now? We had to stay next to Rena-chan, and as soon as we've arrived here, he's vanished!" But then she noticed Rena wasn't there, too. Alone, both of them had started walking inside the crowd, unnoticed. The Italian boy had asked her to go with him, because he was looking for someone, and four eyes are always better than two. Luckily, during his research, most of the participants were already talking with somebody else, so they hadn't been blocked by anyone; but his fortune was about to end soon, and a muscled hand grabbed Giancarlo's left shoulder: "Hey, wait, where do you think to go?"

"Well..." He gave a glance at that man, recognizing him and the group of countrymen around him.

"Serco-san, I haven't thanked you yet, for your good advice! Exchanging that old warehouse with some new agricultural machinery has been my salvation, you don't know how much money I'm saving!"

"I-it was nothing special... you didn't use that store so often, and it had been enough to use some simple formula usually employed for analysis and optimization..."

"You don't need to be that modest!" the farmer answered, hitting his back strongly with his opened hand, making him coughing. "Oh, so you don't seem that strong... Well, it doesn't matter, bookworms don't need an outstanding body. Feel free to come to my house any time you want, I'll be happy to offer you a beer." And he went on giving him painful slaps on his back, greatly enjoying himself, while the others laughed amused. Theirs was a genuine sign of appreciation and friendship, of course, but its first effect had nearly been the uprooting of Giancarlo's lungs from his chest.

Anyway, finally a voice saved him: "Gii, are you making some new friend?"

While reviving, he looked at Rika, who was smiling like a lovely little girl.

"More or less..."

"This is good. Being a good neighbor is always the best choice. Nippa~!" But while finishing that sentence, she realized her feet didn't touch the ground anymore. Rena was bringing her to home, unable to resist to her cute red and white coat, which made her be alike one of Santa Claus's helper.

"Heeeeeeey, pleeeaaaaaaaase waaaaaaait, Reeeeeeena-chaaaaaaan!" shouted Rika, who couldn't almost speak, since Rena's fast run was strongly shaking her. She was looking like really going to home, through the crowd and with her as trophy... But, luckily, at a certain point she was blocked by an old couple, who greeted her and who began to talk to her.

"Oh my, aren't you Ryuugu-san? One of their friends?" Two known faces were staring at her, amused.

"Keresana-san, I was looking for you!" exclaimed Giancarlo. "I am very glad to see you here." He wasn't lying, for him they were like members of his own family, especially in that far zone of the world.

"We were sure you were searching for us, that's why we are here!" said Kogorou Keresana "After all this seems a nice chance to see something interesting, I couldn't stay at home!"

"You could regret it, honey, tonight you will be so tired that you'll do nothing but go to bed at once..." replied her wife.

"Let's stop this speech at once, I don't even want to hear it." he answered, annoyed "By the way, Giancarlo-kun, we've met your friends, before, and we were told to ask you to join them, in case we ran into you. They are in the middle of the square, next to the fountain, you can't miss them."

"Y-yes, I was told about it, too..." added Rika, reviving from her recent experience with Rena "Let's go there at once..."

Two minutes later, the whole club, and not only its members, was by the fountain, surrounded by all the people they had gathered. As Shion had anticipated, her sister was wearing a marvelous blue kimono, her hair gathered up in a nice and labored bun. Her sabots were maybe a bit too little, it wouldn't have been so easy to walk during the march with them, but they were the only footwear who really suited that traditional dress. _It's curious somewhat, such a blue dress doesn't suit the Demon Onee should pretend to be, _Shion thought, _Maybe a red one, or even a green one would have fit more for the purpose. But she's so wonderful... she doesn't want to scare as our grandmother did in the past, she wants to be a charismatic leader, able to convince the others thanks to her ideas, and not because of the fear she can imbue into them. _That was approximately what Mion was thinking, too. Her glance was visibly satisfied, and her haughty look had also raised her sister's envy, at least for some second. That demonstration was to give her a strong sense of self-realization, she was ready to show she was worthy of the role Oryou and her ancestors had left her.

Not far from her, Kimiyoshi. His look was a bit shabby, on the contrary of Mion. The two of them hadn't talked a lot with each other in the last days, there was still a few uneasiness. The chief of the Sonozaki family didn't look angry with him anymore... but now, she seemed to have got indifferent to him. She was looking alike trying to avoid any dialogue with him, who had been one of her closest friends until a few weeks before. Therefore, the only one Kimiyoshi could discuss with was Nabiha Seiji, the one who had suggested to him the name of that criminal expert. He had joined the march as well, claiming to desire to save the honor of his family name, and now he was being informed about the details of the rally.

Finally, Keiichi. He looked like he was going to get married, with his elegant black coat, the read necktie, and the gel on his hair. The typical dress for an important ceremony, or a meeting. And, after all, he was there in an official capacity, that outfit was suitable for the role he was to perform together with the prefect. And Rena, turning at him, felt her heart trembling. She knew that after that day he was likely about to be announced as Mion's future husband, bringing to despair lots of young waitresses at the Angel Mort. But the girl's pain was lesser than the one she had suffered in the past days, and it was vanishing, little by little. Thanks also to the kindness and the attention Alice had shown towards her, Rena was accepting the state of affairs, burying her old sentiments, and now she was sincerely happy for her friends.

There was a lot she could still do for them. And in fact she saw soon Keiichi and Mion reaching the top of the march, after explaining to the others what they were going to do, and asking them to involve as much as possible the other participants by shouting proclamations and proper mottoes. The pair of youths took the lead of that fierce multitude, and they began to walk with resolve towards their goal. The X Hour had arrived.

They went through the first two roads, shouting to the world what they were aiming for. That was still a cold morning, the pale Sun of that day was not hot enough to warm the city, but this didn't dishearten them. Alice, in the vanguard of the march, could even catch the happiness in their eyes. They were happy, that demonstration reminded them about the pride, the bravery which they had shown during the Dam War. Most of them yelled a couple of sentences, then they chatted with their neighbors, they laughed joyfully and finally they shouted something else, again. Theirs was a protest, indeed, but most of all theirs was a way to show Hinamizawa was alive, and that the bonds between its inhabitants were very strong. It seemed that the most important thing, for them, was not to reach their aim, but to fight together to reach it. _It is... marvelous. I can't stay out of it. _Alice, concluding that, reached Shion and Satoko, who were coordinating the shouting of the crowd, not far from her, looking for the best mottoes to use. There, in turn she started yelling strongly, excited, and the others appreciated her behavior, repeating her slogans and clapping her. She got so pleased in that moment, she was thinking of herself as an integral part of that group, and she was happy, too.

Next to her, Satoko was trying to involve her brother, as challenged by the Italian girl. In the past their family was on the opposite side, they were against the majority of Hinamizawa's population, thus they were hated. But now they were fighting together, for the same goal. This was the last step of their appeasement with the community, and this was what they wanted to. So she pushed Satoshi again and again, until he finally shouted too. A rumble coming from the people around him welcomed that effort, really satisfied, and the others started shaking his hand, or ruffling his head. Satoshi was a bit embarrassed, but in the end he really appreciated these fond gestures.

And so Shion did. She was by him, and she was so glad to see them in that situation. Inside her heart, she was thanking her sister for that march. She didn't hate her family any more. She had never felt rancor against Mion, but she couldn't bear with what had happened to the Houjous in the past, with the isolation they had been subjected to, mostly because of the Sonozakis. But now they were all together, maybe even on the score of Oryou's death. The old ruler of the clan was seen as the woman who hated them the most, and it didn't matter if probably it wasn't true, this perception had been for a long time the cause of Satoshi and Satoko's exclusion... Shion, suddenly, began to be feeling sorry for her grandmother's destiny. Only her death might have led to a complete appeasement, and this meant she was condemned not to see her community happy and joyful again. Maybe... maybe she had even decided to let herself die, once she had seen Keiichi's manliness and will. Hinamizawa was in good hands, her presence was not fundamental anymore, and if she had passed away sooner, that process would have finished earlier. Inside her heart, Shion was understanding how much Oryou had suffered, and she was forgiving her.

Then, the green-haired girl looked at Rika, who was preceding all the others, by Kimiyoshi, Keiichi and Mion. The little blue girl was keeping silent, and mentally debating with Hanyuu about what was in the wind. Rika's ancestor was reminding her the far past times, when using Hinamizawa's Spirit meant fighting a real battle against near villages, and against rambling groups of bandits. They had fought roughly, against enemies whose number was often higher than theirs, and they had won, without allowing any of the defeated to live... Those harsh battles had been what had created their past name as Demon's sons, after all, a lot of blood had been poured out in those wars. Using the strength of the village in a completely peaceful and effective way was an astonishing result, the Dam War hadn't caused directly any death, but there had been a lot of incidents. Now, instead, everything was to be diverse, it was to be like when they had rescued Satoko from Teppei's clutches, in that other world. Rika was so proud of this march.

Mion, instead, even if very next to Rika, was not thinking about that subject, she couldn't do that. To be fully honest, she wasn't thinking at all. She was focused, while approaching to Keiichi. And then _SLAP!,_ a sudden and powerful smack at his neck. Keiichi fell to the ground, risking to dirty his brand new jacket, and then he stood up immediately, looking for revenge and pretending to wash her face. But both of them were laughing... It was a way to play everything down, and indeed the ones around them laughed, too. After the end of this story, they would have gone back to school, they would have joined the club again, and they would have been happy again. Mion knew she couldn't become again the carefree girl she had been, she had a family to rule, but Keiichi was next to her, and she could always allow herself some amusing joke and activity, with her friends. She didn't need to stop being the noisy hoyden she used to be.

Just behind Rika, Mion and Keiichi, Rena was walking too. She was sure to perceive it. Oyashiro-sama was with them, was so near to her. That united spirit between the participants, that sense of friendship and sharing... That was what she had been looking for. Those feelings were what she needed, she knew that in her life she was about to face other hard periods, in addition to the one they were living now, but her friends were not the only ones who could assist her, as during the relationship between Rina and her father. Now she could avail of the support of the whole Hinamizawa: nobody in the village would have refused to help her, and she would have helped anybody who asked for it. And moreover in that moment she was so near to her closest friends, she couldn't fear to be harmed by the one who had sent that letter, while she was surrounded by so many attentive people. That menacing message sounded as far as never before.

They went on marching and singing for quite a long time, going through Okinomiya's large avenues. But suddenly, looking behind her, Rena noticed a little boy standing over the crowd. He was probably on someone's shoulders, she would have never seen him otherwise. After a couple of seconds, however, that boy pointed at someone, or something, and he quickly disappeared. _I wonder who he was, I couldn't recognize him from here... Oh, well, it's all fine, I hope he's having fun as we're having._

Rena was not the only one who looked at the scene. The Keresanas reached quickly the zone he was in, and there they found Giancarlo. Amazed to see him far from the rest of the club, they asked him what had happened.

"Oh... nothing. He was weeping, he had lost himself, so I've taken on my shoulders to permit him to look for his parents. Fortunately they were in the vicinity, but it was not unexpected, they had gone out of his sight only some second before. Everything is OK, now."

"You're surprising me, really." answered Kogorou "We're all shouting, nearly singing, so excited... And you go for a boy who's crying softly?"

"We are not all shouting, Keresana-san. I am not. I am not used to."

"You should start, then. This is the best chance to do it, I'd say."

Giancarlo shook his head. "I really can't see why should I do it. My voice is nearly useless, here, likely even my presence is so. They won't hear us better if I start to talk up too."

"Mother Teresa of Calcutta once said _We ourselves feel that what we are doing is just a __drop __in the __ocean, b__ut the __ocean __would be less because of that missing __drop__._ Don't you think this suits your situation?" replied Kogorou's wife, learned as her usual.

"This is not the same scenario. Mother Teresa is a blessed woman, and she deserves everybody's respect, but now we aren't fulfilling an ocean, but a bathtub... less than half of this crowd would be enough. You can see the large streets we are going through, they have prepared the most important roads for us, an imaginary red carpet set up to allow all these people to pass easily and comfortably, but first of all they want to stress the power and the influence of who is leading them. And all these policemen who are closing the side roads, and escorting us. I've seen also Flavia, before, she has even hailed most of the participants. This is just a formal ceremony, not a protest where you fight for something you aren't sure to get. Indeed, this is... a sort of parade, a celebration. It's so easy, when the person who you claim to want to convince already agrees with you."

"Everyone is happy because of it, why aren't you? Would you prefer a real war, rather?"

"A real war? No, no, I don't want anybody to be harmed, now. And I can see they are happy, I don't blame them, they will protect their community, they are sure to attain their purpose. Give a glance at the club, there. Satoko, Shion, even Alice... they are guiding the others, they like the environment they are in, now, and they are doing what they think it is the right thing to do. And once she's with them, neither Rena needs my help, that's why I am here, far from them. I don't know if these people are really Demons, or Angels... To me, they look like perfect Gods, confident, faithful in their skills and in their friends, invincible... They are..." he closed his eyes, to finish the sentence "They are scary. Keiichi is, most of all. They frighten me. How can be these people, how can Keiichi, Mion, Shion, Rena, and the other, and even Alice... how can they be so radiant and powerful?"

Keresana noticed he wasn't using any honorifics, spelling those last words, and he quickly realized the reason. Giancarlo was not really talking to him, he was talking to himself.

"Yes..." he went on "They are happy, noisy... Noisy, indeed... Can you guess it? When I had arrived in Hinamizawa, before getting that flu, the first thing I had noticed was the noise of the cicadas. Those insects sounded so happy, so ready to show their wish to live happily, under the hot Sun of the summer months. They are present in Italy, too, but they are quieter, they are not as happy as yours, or at least I imagined they are so. Yes, cicadas are noisy... and all of them, and Alice too, are cicadas. Cicadas full of energy, joyful and happy... Yes, happy... happy..." His dull eyes looked at the crowd, getting wet, and his face silently wormed forming a sad smile, noticed by nobody but the Keresanas.

"So... you are not a cicada, that's what you're saying. What are you?"

"Me?" Giancarlo eyed him surprised, with an absent glance. He hadn't ever thought about it, and he didn't answer for more than a minute. Then his mouth was opened another time. "Yes, I am a moth."

"A moth?"

He nodded. "A moth is a solitary insect, wandering during the night, and being content with the few light coming from the moon, or a lamp. You can observe it after the sunset, when there is no more sunlight, you can observe it, flying alone, noiseless. They are not noisy like cicadas. Cicadas sing to attract partners of the other sex, and so they form large groups... A moth doesn't feel this need."

"This is not true." the old couple tried to move him "If moths were always alone, there wouldn't be larvae, and the specie would become extinct in a flash."

"Isn't it true? Just the same. To me, it's just like it is. My... _My_ moths..." he highlighted that word "_My _moths are destined to a separate life, to a solitary existence... That's why I'm not unhappy because Alice is with the others and she has let me here alone. I really wouldn't be anyhow happy, today, in such a large crowd, but leaving her flying away can allow her to be so. We are different, our... our paths on this cruel Earth are different. They forgot about me, but they are not wrong... Cicadas with cicadas, moths with moths... And so, moths alone."

"You shouldn't think in this way."

"Why, Keresana-san? Look at the prefecture, it's in front of us, now." They observed it. A new building, rather big and imposing, full of large windows protected by grates. It had been realized next to a T-shaped crossroad, whose other two large ways had been blocked by quite a high number of policemen. Twenty steps between the main entrance and the road, an ideal staircase for the magnificent show which was going to be arranged by Keiichi and the prefect. "Can you see it? This large straight avenue, that giant building... This is like being in a theater, or in an ancient cathedral... The prefecture itself is a huge wonderful altar... And everything is ready for..."

Giancarlo didn't finish the sentence, his eyes had abruptly come back to normality. On the right side of the avenue, a small yard occupied a little part of the roadway, not more than 50-100 meters far from the prefecture, just before the crossroad. A couple of lifted manholes, a little container and a van, two or three barrows, and some other building material. Nobody was working inside it at that moment, which was normal, since it was Sunday.

"This is really odd." exclaimed Noriko, Kogorou's wife, while observing it. "It really seems that there is something unexpected here, even for them. If only it had been a bigger one, it would have been a serious embarrassment, it would have hindered the passage, and the Sonozakis would have been compelled to modify their plans due to a microscopic hitch... Oh, well, that wouldn't have been a true issue, however. It's a nice luck that today is a holiday, but it wouldn't have made any real difference, even if there had been some worker here. They'd anyway have looked for the responsible of the yard, asking him not to work and to stay at home, this morning. The noise coming from hammer drills and the blasphemies shouted by some impolite bricklayer would have totally ruined this epic day..." While she was speaking, the Italian boy went on eying that zone, he was hardly listening to the woman's comment. Indeed, that was an intruder in that environment, and thus it was making him so curious, like charmed by those ordinary tools and those shining metal sheets.

Thirty minutes passed, while almost the whole crowd was shouting mottoes and singing songs about Hinamizawa, and the importance of protecting it. Finally, they stopped. Someone had opened the doors of the palace before them, and a lordly figure came out, standing on the top of the staircase.

"My name is Sonozaki Saborou, Governor and Prefect of the district of Okinomiya because of the Emperor's grace. The organizers of this protest, the leaders of the demonstration are asked to show themselves, and to explain the reason of this manifestation." Hearing this, two young people appeared at the bottom of the same staircase, and one of them began to speak with the identical solemn tone:

"Sonozaki-sama, I'm Maebara Keiichi, and I represent this crowd, coming from the villages of Hinamizawa, Okinomiya, Takatsudo, Kiyotsu, Matsumoto and Tanikawa. We are here to denounce a very serious danger menacing the whole community of Hinamizawa, the one I have the honor to call as my hometown. Two months ago, a geologist who is now untraceable spread fear and apprehension over all of us, presenting a study where he claimed that our village was about to be destroyed by an unavoidable catastrophe, a giant landslide. We are aware that research has been brought to the prefecture, in order to make this fraud more effective, so you can easily control my words. But unfortunately for us, he likely belonged to a criminal organization, because just some day after, a lot of countrymen of ours were dejected by some unidentified crooks. Subjugated by their legit concern, they have been convinced to sign agreements where they sell their goods for a ridiculously low amount of money. None of this criminals has been found yet, after the discovery of this fraud, and now all of the ones I am spokesperson of are afraid to lose everything they have. As citizen of this modest but dignified village, I can't accept the situation generated by a so vile deceit, and I'm aiming for justice, from you and from the institution you're actually representing."

Everyone vigorously clapped, showing to support his words. The prefect looked at him, serious:

"So, what can this Emperor's humble servant do for you, and all your companions?"

"As I've said before, we're aiming for justice for them, we're not aiming for more than what it's good to ask. We want them to be granted that all those contracts will be considered deleted, and that they will have no legal value, because they have been signed thanks to a fraudulent act, and only thanks to that. We want all those criminals to be arrested, and all their previous frauds to be discovered, in order to allow their victims to be refunded, and we are not talking only about the ones from this district, but even the ones all over this Country. We want a real research about the current situation of our territory, in order not to be deceived anymore by this kind of cheaters."

Another pelting applause. All of them had studied their own part, and Keiichi was a great actor, but it wasn't the first time that he was showing that gift.

"So" answered the prefect "What will happen, if I don't fulfill your requests?"

"You have been certainly told about the Dam War, about what is labeled with reverence as Hinamizawa's Spirit, and about the real strength of our village. You were already serving our Country in this palace, when those facts had taken place, so it's not hard for you to recall them. And hence, if it's not your intention to do what I've asked you for, I can grant that you and all the other competent offices will be rushed off your feet, you won't be able to rest, our endless protests will persecute you, until you decide finally to change your mind!"

A final applause, even bigger than the first one. Mion looked at Keiichi, smiling. His figure was one belonging to a boy who was quickly growing up, charming, renown... He was an adult, almost, ready to fight for the people he cares the most. And for her, too.

The prefect closed his eyes, taking a break as to think about what his interlocutor had just said, then he opened them again and he answered: "Maebara Keiichi-san, I've heard your words, and I can see the reasons who are pushing you. I can't stay motionless, after that such a painful matter has come to my ears, and so I am going to listen to you. I'm-"

He couldn't end the sentence. A tremendous explosion destroyed one of the rooms on the ground floor of the prefecture, launching pieces of cement and covering with a black smoke who had come next to that hall. And immediately after that, someone from the throng started throwing stones against the building, breaking the glass of one of the windows.

"What the hell are they doing?" Mion yelled. But nobody could answer, nobody had seen who has made that criminal damage, they had closed their eyes because of the explosion, and they were confused. Those unknown vandals had quickly stopped to throw those pebbles, but suddenly a second burst hit another office of the palace, blowing it up and totally destroying it.

Nobody could realize what was happening, and the multitude started to scream, and to move recklessly, running away without an exact direction. And someone started again to throw stones, likely taking them from the little yard not far from them. Kids were crying, while their parents were trying to calm them, while bringing them far from there. The elderly people instead stayed still, their old legs didn't give them the chance to leave rapidly the place, and they were paralyzed and afraid to be swept away, if the others had started running away. But also adults weren't calm, they feared to be involved in a disaster, and they went on shouting, protesting now against everyone: against who was throwing the stones, against who had organized the march, against the Sonozakis, against the Kimiyoshis, against the Furudes, against Keiichi, against the prefect himself, against the police, against who was unable to grant their safety...

The whole situation was degenerating, and none from the club knew what to do. Immediately Satoshi had hugged Satoko, to protect her. Giancarlo was still in the rear zone of the crowd, too far to even try to give a hand in that moment. As for Rika and Rena, they were trying to calm everybody down, speaking by the megaphone they had used during the march, but it was all useless. Shion and Alice, instead, were looking at Keiichi and Mion, who were not ready to such an unforeseen event. And also all the policemen present had been taken unawares, including Flavia: they had been instructed not to do anything for the whole demonstration, and they didn't know what they could attempt now, their number was too low to take care of that giant human ocean.

Mion gazed at Keiichi, and she implored him: "Kei-chan, please! I... I don't know what to do, it's frightening! Please, help us!" But the boy was scared as well, there didn't seemed to be any solution. So, by seeing how the other had got petrified before that disheartening scene, Mion definitely realized that what they had arranged for that day had been completely wrecked. It was so frustrating... She closed her eyes, angrily, biting her nails and asking herself about the reasons of that disaster.

Finally, Satoko freed herself from her brother's hands, noticing a very important thing. Inside the building, there were three offices on the ground floor with a window to the crossroad. But only two of them had blown up. Until now.

"Everybody, run away from there! It's going to explode, too!" They heard her, and they tried to obey. But, while turning round, Rena was abruptly pushed towards the third office, falling to the ground. Who had done it? She heard the steps of someone running convulsively away from her, but in that moment she didn't look for that person, she had to stand up first, even if a light ache was coming from her right ankle and it was preventing her from being fast as she wished; however, all in all she was fine. So she got up withstanding a little pain, but while doing it she looked inside the office, she was less than half a meter far from the window, now. And then she saw an object she'd have never liked to see. On one of the tables there was a sort of digital clock, and the time reported on it showed simply 00:05.

And, just a second later, 00:04.

Rena froze. She had understood. She tried to run away, but her aching foot didn't allow to go fast.

It was too late. She closed her eyes, turning her head away from the window, and perceiving her own end coming...

But unexpectedly someone grabbed her arm, and started running to bring her far from there.

"K-K-Keiichi-kun...!" The other said nothing, he didn't have the time to answer. They went away, till the moment they were nearly five meters far from the window, when also the third office exploded, flinging them to the ground. But before falling to the hard cement because of the blast, the boy hugged his friend, as to protect her. Both of them hit violently the ground, but only Rena stood up, while looking shocked at the blood coming out of her brave companion's head.

Therefore, the screams coming from the crowd became unbearable, and every person near to Keiichi got extremely angry. The stress generated from that chain of events got so strong that Takano began to scratch her own neck, shouting desperately _It's the Yamainu! It's the Yamainu! _Inside that chaos, she was heard by nobody but Irie and Tomitake, who tried at once to assuage her, although she wanted to free herself and run away, like a ferocious beast in a little cage. The cautious doctor fortunately had brought with him a little syringe and a phial with a small dose of morphine, and he instantly injected it into the unlucky woman's arm, making her faint.

Everything was going bad, now. All the members of the club, Rika, Mion, Rena... While gazing at Keiichi still on the ground, they felt themselves as the world fell apart around them. They were wordless. They couldn't say anything, in those seconds which seemed eternal.

But finally, Keiichi stood up slowly, laying a hand on the sidewalk and aided by Satoko. His head was still aching, some drop of blood was still coming out of it, and his dress was completely ripped, but he was smiling, to reassure everyone.

"It's... It's not the first time my noggin is so bloodstained, don't worry. I am still here, ready to fight."

Everyone who had attended the scene got a bit relieved. But they couldn't stop being agitated. Most of the multitude was going on shouting, trying to understand what was happening. Someone was still throwing objects against the smoking palace, while someone else started to go up the stairs, furiously, to ask the Prefect what he was going to do for them. Keiichi and the others tried to stop them, helped by the policemen, but they were not just enough to block them.

But, suddenly, they all stopped moving and screaming, as the rest of the crowd quickly did.

On the top of the staircase, next to the Prefect, another figure appeared, asking for silence with his right hand.


	21. Divide et impera

**21 – Divide et impera**

_Okinomiya, 18th December 1983_

Wordless, everybody observed the man who had appeared a pair of steps far from the prefect, on the top of the staircase. Short and thin, around fifty years old, black-haired, wearing a pair of ordinary glasses. His look was nothing special, but his face was not unknown, and this was what was drawing the others' attention.

"Nabiha-san!" exclaimed Kimiyoshi "What are you doing?"

"I just want to speak, but I have to wait for everyone to stay quiet." While saying this, he turned around, towards the Sun, which was disappearing behind a little group of clouds. It could have become annoying for him, staying in that place at that hour meant having the Sun in his eyes, usually, but in that moment he had been lucky. He _was feeling_ lucky... In the middle of those inebriating emotions, he looked down, at that giant crowd. Everyone was silent, immobile, awaiting his words as the most diligent audience. How were their looks, the expressions on their faces? He wasn't sure, in reality, those clouds had also deprived the square of most of the light, and now all those people seemed an enormous indistinct spot, from that distance: from there he could clearly see only those foolish youngsters in the front row. Well, it had no importance, that was to be his personal moment of glory, the day when his family and he were going to regain the honour and the power they had lost. At his home, they all would have become so proud of him, especially that one, that brat who was always so difficult... He could perceive his heart pulsing frantically like a drum, but he couldn't get scared, now. He took a deep breath and he spoke:

"Sonozaki-sama, Governor of this city, I formally ask you to take proper measures, in way of making sure that Maebara Keiichi-san and Sonozaki Mion-san are put under arrest as soon as possible."

Silence. Nobody answered, still as under the influence of a spell. What... what was happening? What was the meaning of that request, made with no forewarning...

"Arrested... And on the charge of what?" asked the prefect, the most used to that kind of situations, and therefore the only one stayed lucid even in that circumstance.

"You have just seen what this protest has caused. They have placed bombs, they have been throwing stones against this building and against you. They are dangerous, and violent, and your role obliges you not to ignore these criminal acts. Of course, you can't find the real convicts for now, it would be impossible, and you can't arrest the whole crowd, so the ones who have led all of them here must take responsibility for everything has happened."

"So I should send them to prison, in your opinion, even if they have done nothing bad." The prefect couldn't answer _They can't have placed those bombs, I know them, _even if it was certainly the truth. It would have been a conflict of interests, and he was forced to behave as impartially as possible, not to make their situation more critical. Namely, Nabiha's accuses were legitimate, and he couldn't defend them, otherwise he had to admit the whole staging, and there would have been serious consequences for him. The prefect Sonozaki was starting to realize how much dangerous the whole issue was becoming.

Nabiha, in fact, nearly skipped the objection addressed to him. "It doesn't matter. Their village has already been a problem for the authorities and for the Government too, in the past, and their leaders have been the inspiration for their desire to rebel. There's no doubt that they are going to repeat what they had done, and this time they seem to avail of violence, as you've just seen. That mob obeys to those boys, even if they are so young: that unanimous applause before has confirmed it, so they have to be made unable to harm the rest of our community." As a matter of fact, the man wasn't aiming at Keiichi. His imprisonment was just a unavoidable consequence of the events, Nabiha's real goal was to make sure that Mion had been arrested: putting the ruler of the Sonozaki family in such a state would have been an incredible blow for them, and he didn't ignore that.

"Nabiha-san!" yelled then Kimiyoshi "Why are you doing this?" Even the rest of the crowd started roaring, they were starting to make out what was that individual's true intent, and also what was happening, but their enemy didn't look frightened by their threatening gestures.

"Kimiyoshi-san, it's nothing personal, I'm doing this as an ordinary Japanese citizen. And I'm protecting my interests, too."

"Your interests? What do you mean?"

Nabiha took a business card from his pocket, and he launched it disdainfully towards the multitude, before declaring: "I'm here as representative of the JOST, the society which has been so wrongly disparaged in this place. After being informed by our collaborators about what was going to happen today, I've been sent here to take a look at it, to check the whole situation, and I had been right, I'd say. We can't tolerate that a group of violent fanatics goes on attacking and menacing us, depriving us of the right to work and grow up."

"No..." answered Kimiyoshi "You had told me you were here just to save your honor, after what that scholar had done!"

"And I'm saving my honor now, indeed, you can't deny it. Mine, and the one of the men I work for, don't you agree with me? You were insulting us, and now I am here to defend myself, and the others I care about."

"This is not what you had told me! I thought... I thought you were helping us! I was so happy of it!"

"Oh, really? And what would I have told you, _exactly_?"

Kimiyoshi didn't answer, so he went on. "I had told you I wanted to take care of my reputation, but I hadn't specified _from what_ I wanted to protect it, don't you remember? I'm sure that you misunderstood my words, that you pretended me to be on your side, and that you told it to everyone, guaranteeing it was all fine... You were feeling so guilty because of that poor figure of yours, and you wanted to remedy, am I wrong?"

Kimiyoshi lowered his eyes, embarrassed and anguished. He didn't know what to do. Mion, then, looked at him, terribly sorry. _I can grasp his feelings, now... If I hadn't been so rude with him, so indifferent, maybe his sense of guilt wouldn't have been so strong, he wouldn't have been so desperate, and he wouldn't have looked for such a way to redeem. I should have been nearer to him, in that way I could have noticed Nabiha-san's real aims. I left him alone... it's... it's my fault. But what could I do, now? _

She looked at Keiichi, looking for help. The boy realized the girl's prayer, but he couldn't move in to attack, his bloodstained head was still aching, evidently. It was inevitably Mion's turn to answer, therefore. "Hmm... well, you really are cheeky!" she shouted "You've come here in spite of what the JOST has made against us, against Hinamizawa? You have cheated so many people, and you have nerve enough to show yourself here, and pretend you're right?"

"You're free to discuss with me and the prefect about the lawfulness of the agreements we have signed, it's a right of yours. But not in this manner. You are categorically saying we are criminals, describing us as devils – which is ironical, since you were the ones used to claim to descend from Demons, in the past. You intended not to grant to us our natural right to defend ourselves, and on the score of this you brought here all those noisy people. But you couldn't control them, they were too many, and so you let them behave as they pleased, and they begun to act as vandals, without waiting for the authorities' response either. How could we debate peacefully, with such fanatics on bail?"

Mion thought about a proper answer. Keiichi and she weren't ready for a real verbal fight, that morning. She had thought that he had just to talk with the prefect, repeating a speech they had prepared some day before, but now they had a real opponent in front of him. Keiichi had always been a good speaker, but he couldn't help her effectively now, and they needed a plan, a plan they hadn't had any time to think about. She needed to know what to say, but who could give her any good suggestion?

While hopelessly racking her brains about this, she looked at Nabiha, from the bottom of the staircase. He was paying back her glance, smiling, sure to win. She couldn't just surrender, she had to bite the bullet... But now she hadn't to convince him, she had to defeat him, it was so different from the other times. When Keiichi supported the others with his positive attitude, giving them the bravery to fight the Yamainu, and when he had had to persuade Oryou and the City Council, to save Satoko from Teppei's abuses... In those circumstances, all of their interlocutors were already agreeing with him, but they couldn't admit it, and Keiichi had just been able to give them the strength to do so. And even in that cases, Rena had been decisive, saying the right things in the right moment. Mion hadn't, and that was making her sad.

_But... when had we to do this?, _Mion noticed suddenly. _It's strange, Teppei had been killed before the Watanagashi, and he never has been in Hinamizawa recently... Still, I... I can remember that we fought against his wickedness towards Satoko-chan... As if... we had done that in another world. _It was not the first time she had those deja-vu, and she froze for a second. But immediately she shook her head, vigorously, it wasn't the right moment to think about that. She raised her eyes and she yelled peremptorily:

"Do you really think we will surrender? You're mad, if you think so. We have a village to defend, and just saying that you have done nothing bad against us won't save your plans. Do you really wish a long war, between you and we?"

"If it is necessary, I'm doing it. I've already told you I'm protecting our interests, and I'm not scared by a trial. I supposed the JOST is quite used to it, like every important society. But are _you _ready for a long enervating war, instead?"

"We've already done it, once. And we've won."

"But this time it's diverse. The rabble you had let off the leash of has just shown its real nature, and the unavoidable result of this behavior will be your arrest. And without their leader, and without all the people who are on the point of leaving your village... I am not sure you're going to resist for a long time. I wonder why you're still there, free to harass me, indeed."

"Can't I defend myself, now? I'm doing what you were doing too, before. And the prefect is the one who really decides, so, until he gives that order, I can stay here."

"I see. Well, let's see what he has to tell us..."

And the prefect only stared at them. He didn't know what to say to help her nephew Mion, Nabiha really knew what he was doing. For each answer different from the one he wanted to hear, he could use their degree of kinship as weapon, claiming it was a scandal that a public authority didn't arrest a dangerous person only because he was his uncle. The prefect hesitated, uncertain whether opening his mouth or not... but fortunately he was preceded by someone, at last:

"Do you think that the Spirit of our village will be blocked by this? We're still all together, and the ones who will be sent away will fight with the ones who will stay. You can't divide us so easily! And then, you can't just pretend to be a pure accuser, have you forgotten what you have done? Giving to all of them only a third of what they deserved, this is a fraud, this is the real crime!"

Mion looked at her right. Keiichi was still by her, touching his head, and unable to help her fully, but he wanted to make her feel his presence, he wanted to give all his support, and he had told those words to suggest her what to say. Nabiha was the guilty, in all this story, and he was the one who had to defend himself. She smiled, happy. She was not alone, all her friends were looking at her, to cheer her. While Rena had started to medicate Keiichi, using a medical kit coming from the infirmary of the prefecture, Mion turned her eyes against Nabiha, with a renewed vigor.

"So, Nabiha-san, how can you answer to this? That note on the agreements clearly proves that you knew about the falseness of that research, and that you were ready to take advantage of it. Moreover, can you deny that the full name of the JOST – Japanese Office for Services on the Territory – could deceive a lot of us? And why should your group have tried to buy the whole village although it was destined to be destroyed by a landslide, as your employees were claiming? After that catastrophe, its value was to decrease to less than a tenth of what it is now, theoretically you would have lost tons of money... Unless you were keeping the lid on something."

"Oh" he answered "There are so many uses even for a valley with no houses, don't you agree? As a matter of fact, the Government itself was determined to do the same thing, some year ago, demolishing all your nice buildings and addressing your zone to another purpose. However, I don't even feel the need to answer to your silly questions... Let your people tell their own opinion."

"What do you mean?"

Nabiha closed his eyes, opened his arms and shouted, in the loudest voice he was able to:

"Citizens of the village called Hinamizawa, listen to me! Here I, Nabiha Seiji, officially declare that I wasn't aware of the baselessness of the theory about the giant landslide, and our society is conscious that who has sold all his goods to us is risking to be paid with an amount of money not large enough to satisfy their primary needs, which could cause them some very serious problem. That note had been added just to protect the investments of the company I'm representing here, but I want to make amends for it right now: each of the signers, with no exceptions, will be paid the 100% of the real value of their goods, and that note will be considered deleted. I'm personally ready to sign other formal agreements, which will cancel the previous ones. The new contracts will be made only of two or three lines, with no hidden notes, you can also write it yourself, if you prefer so. As only condition for it, I ask all these people to leave Hinamizawa right after signing the contract, and being given the stipulated money. Is this satisfying?"

"This is a mere extort, a blackmail! How can you even only imagine than this will save you from the charge of fraud?"

"I haven't said this to protect myself from your stupid accusations, Sonozaki-san. Look behind you."

Mion didn't need to turn her eyes. The jangle coming from the crowd was enough, to make her understand. A lot of them didn't find that proposal unfair, and the leaders of the protest clearly heard someone saying that he would have accepted. The moment was harsh, and Alice was looking right and left, as if she was looking for something, and she was observing the whole scene to try to understand the evolution of the situation. Even the other members of the club were hearing the speeches coming from the multitude, while their own community seemed on the point of betraying them.

"Can you realize it now, Sonozaki-san?" explained Nabiha, while going down the staircase, and stopping on the half of it. "A single person can be as smart as you please, but crowds are always very stupid. They are governed not by reason, but by irrational feelings, anger and fear. In particular, they all are feared, now. They have seen what has happened, they know what will happen to you, and they are hounded by the doubt that fighting together won't be so effective as during the Dam War. The 25-30% of your population will go immediately away, and once you have no leaders and only a bunch of people on your side..."

"It's not true!"

"It is true, instead. They couldn't admit it, they were frightened by you like they had been frightened by Oryou-sama, but a lot of people couldn't wait for escaping from your beloved village, and what I've proposed is what they wanted. Their presence was something that everyone already knew, you too. That's why they're all going to accept my proposal. No-one can know how many people actually want to go away, this part of your community had always kept their feelings hidden, and nobody has ever been able to count them. But this is an advantage for me: you can't say how many they are, so who has signed will be terrified by the idea that their group is numerous, and they will get afraid of being sent away by Hinamizawa in exchange for just some change. Nobody is going to refuse, in the end."

Mion froze. It was not possible... The whole crowd was debating behind her, and they couldn't either hear what Nabiha and she were speaking about. All their hearts were far from her, now, and they wouldn't have helped her in that moment, if she had needed to. She had to react, but fortunately her friends were still with her, and Rena asked angrily:

"Why are you doing this? If you pay the 100% to everyone, why are you doing this? You won't earn anything!"

"Well, in a normal situation you'd be absolutely right, but not in this case. Don't ask me why, but the JOST is incredibly interested in your village. In order to lay their hands on it, they are going to give me three times the sum of money I'm spending to buy your hometown."

"And in order to do what? To sell it to the Government and to build the Dam?"

"Kimiyoshi-san, don't make me laugh. I don't know their last aim, but if they had wanted to do so, I should have bought other villages, besides Hinamizawa. You should know it better than me. The water necessary for the working of the Dam would have overflown not only your hamlet, but also other ones. Or rather were you thinking to be the heart of the Universe?"

"I know it, Nabiha-san! Their inhabitants had even joined us, today, and I'm not forgetting them. But I also recall that ours had been the only one fighting against the Dam, in the past, and defeating us would mean getting rid of the most dangerous annoyance."

"The only real annoyance here is your voice, Kimiyoshi-san... Well, I don't know the future of your valley, and personally I don't care about it. Personally I think about myself as one of their external contributors, which is not a bad idea. They don't know everything about me, I don't know everything about them. It's a pretty safe choice, nobody endangers nobody in this way, don't you agree?"

Nabiha was challenging them, now, as amused by all that desperation. That excitement was making feel alive, important and realized.

"At least, can we know if the main purpose of the JOST was buying our homeland, and chasing us away? What have we made, to make them so cruel towards us? Once Hinamizawa belongs to them, what will happen of his inhabitants? Will they be tormented even later?"

"I don't know. Your ears have serious problems, I've just explained that I'm not aware of all their projects. Maybe their aim is just to make your life a real pain, Kimiyoshi-san." He smiled, jeering at his old friend.

"You, dirty... Do you think that the whole village will surrender so easily?" shouted Mion, repeating what she had told previously "I will take all the responsibility of those incidents, if necessary, and so my friends will throw a spanner in the works, and with the rest of the village they're going to fight until...!"

"Yes, sure, I've already heard this story. Sonozaki-san, how many people do you believe will plump for your group, in the incoming days?"

She didn't answer, waiting for him to finish speaking: "You know, more than 500 people have sold everything... but they are not the only ones who are going to leave."

"What?"

"Oh, it's the truth. Do you think that all the villagers in Hinamizawa own the houses they are living in? Or have you forgotten about rented houses? You know, in these cases, the real proprietor of those buildings can decide to send its tenant away, with a little forewarning, of course, but this won't be a significant problem."

"It can't be... and their owner is..."

"Oh, sure. I've already bought nearly all of them months ago, most of the previous owners were not from Hinamizawa, or they didn't care about them, so I could do the whole operation without being noticed; I've always been in the darkness, if you prefer to define it so. We are talking about at least 150-200 more villagers, another 10% of the population. Oh, just in case, I am also sure that a lot of the people I haven't contacted yet will come to me, offering voluntarily to sell their buildings. They are all so scared, now, and I could behave like a heartless businessman, buying out their goods for next to nothing, but I'm going to propose to them the same offer I had done to the others. The full value of those fields and houses, not a cent less than it... This will make things simpler."

Mion started panting, while Nabiha went on: "Have you finally realized it? In the end, I'm pretty confident that no more than eight or nine hundred villagers will be still in Hinamizawa, when my licit offensive has finished. Without you, their spiritual leader, and without most of the population, do you think they will oppose their final destiny for a long time? However, if they even only decide to hinder the others' move, the police won't be kind with them, on the contrary of what has happened during the Dam War. I really have to say that I had come here only to check the whole situation, but those explosions have been a very pleasant present." He approached Mion, and he whispered in her ear: "Yes, I'd really thank you for that..."

That was it. Not tolerating to be humiliated to such an extent, she furiously tried to hit him with her fist, but the man ran away, defter and faster than her, and then he went up some step of the staircase, kidding her opponent and laughing at her rudeness, while the others were desperately blocking their classmate, who would have killed him if she could. Finally Mion calmed down, while Shion asked: "And what will happen to the villagers who are going to stay at Hinamizawa? If they don't want to move, they can stay there, they haven't signed anything."

"Oh, they are about to be soon dislodged from your little hamlet. Buying the others' houses, and lands, has given me other significant advantages: for example, it has allowed me to control also nearly all the water supply canals in the zone, without forgetting the mills... It will be impossible for everyone to work in their rice fields, they won't be able to survive, if they decide to be pig-headed and stay there. I've calculated this aspect, too, I have chosen properly what to buy in the beginning."

"You are a monster! This... this can't be lawful! Are you ready to let them die from starvation, to reach your aim?"

"You should blame yourself, instead of shouting at me, Sonozaki-san. Those infrastructures were vital for your village, and still you didn't take care of them."

"Well, they could contact directly the JOST to sell everything, then. At least they will be given all that extra money, and you're going to be left empty-handed."

Mion, Kimiyoshi and Rika looked at Keiichi, who had made that absurd proposal. "Kei-chan, how could you even..." He was only provoking him, he wasn't serious, but there words were enough to make their blood run cold. Mion, in particular, couldn't accept it, but hearing him had made her turn instinctively at the multitude she had gathered, and she realized something she'd never have liked to see. With them, there was a visibly littler crowd, now. A lot of people had already gone away, not being able to understand what was happening by the prefecture, and being tired to wait for news which seemed to never arrive. Many others were imitating them, she could see them reaching on foot the secondary roads adjacent to the large and majestic avenue they had walked along before. And about the few ones still there, who were mainly the individuals come from Hinamizawa, they were going on discussing with each other, trying to make out alone what to do and ignoring what their leaders were saying. She had failed, and disappointed she started crying. But Nabiha's laugh resounded suddenly in her mind, making her mechanically raise her head.

"Maebara-san, despite the headache you probably are suffering from, yours has been surely the only sensed sentence of this whole day! It's a real pity you're going to jail soon. Well, sure, if they want to do so, they are free to do that, but they must contact our group all together, the JOST won't deal with a single villager, I suppose. In this way I'd earn less money, I guess, but this story would finish earlier, without further annoyances, and I would be paid sooner, which is never a bad thing."

It was a provocation, told to answer to another provocation. Nabiha was conscious of the fact that Hinamizawa's pride would have never accepted such a humbling compromise. And neither Mion's one. She opened her eyes wide, full of anger, and her irides got red, bloodshot. Her teeth were gnashed, almost to the verge of fracturing, and her fists were creaking, so tightly closed that some drop of blood start coming from her wrists. Pulsing veins stood up on her neck and on her temples, while they were quickly becoming mauvish. Her continuous jumps made her hair messed up, and now it was falling behind her shoulders, loose, following the movement of her quivering head like the nine tails of a monstrous creature.

Her face was not the one of a human being anymore. It was the one of a Demon.

"_You_", she hissed "You know who I am, who we are, right? I'm Sonozaki Mion, ruler of one of the Three Great Families of the Onigafuchi. I don't care if the others leave us alone, but I won't surrender, we won't surrender. And if someone else joins us, we'll give him all the money he needs to live. We can do so forever, we are going to do so forever. And in the meanwhile, your fate will be to be mashed by our enormous strength. You should know about those stories about us... We have a whole room, dedicated to vile people like you..."

The others, unawares, went slightly away from her, terrified. Was she the friend they had always known? Mion was looking cynical, wicked, cruel. Another person. As if the devil which was told to sleep in her body had awakened, struggling with her, saying what she was saying, and giving her the right to affirm _We are Sonozaki Mion._

Of course, she was doing so for their own benefit, they were sure of that, but still... The only one calm was Nabiha, who was instead expecting to be going to face the Queen of the Demons, and that was exactly what he was looking for. Instead of running away, or being scared, he took another deep breath, and he answered:

"Sonozaki-_chan_, you are offending me. You are menacing me, but you can't keep these fateful promises. Haven't you got the figure of what will happen, yet? You're going to be under arrest with extremely severe charges, and quite surely all your transactional accounts will be blocked, that's the procedure they usually follow during their inquiries. You are not twenty years old yet, and probably their holder is a nominee, maybe it's your mother; but it doesn't matter, you aren't the owner of that money but it's like you were, everyone here knows who is the real ruler - you have just confirmed it not more than thirty seconds ago. Terrorists like you deserve not to have any money in any bank, and I can't say how much longer you'll be able to resist, using only the cash you have at your home."

"TERRORISTS?" Mion's anger reached the peak, Nabiha was treating her like a baby girl. She bit her lips wrathfully, and a bloody stream started coming out from there; the veins on her neck were pulsing frantically, she stopped breathing. Her blood pressure was out of control, her skin darkened, her eyes ached, trembling. Furious as never before, she grabbed the right sleeve of her blue kimono, and she tore it off completely, till her shoulder, ripping to shreds also the one of her traditional petticoat.

"_HOW CAN YOU DARE CALLING US TERRORISTS! _Our revenge will be ruthless, you are going to go through Hell, you're going to implore us to be killed, to be demoned away!"

"And are you trying to scare me in that pathetically way, now? I know everything about your family. I am aware of how your grandfather had earned all your fund, you would still be a poor flock of penniless lemmings, otherwise. And I've seen how your grandmother was able to force the others to respect her. Do you want to imitate her, now? Come on, let's go to your torture room, if you want so. It would be very interesting."

"Don't provoke me, you might regret it..."

"Hmm, the power of your family doesn't thrill us, we wouldn't have faced you, if it hadn't been so. Maybe don't I know also how many stores and restaurants can you control, thanks to the money you've lent them? Oh, I can only imagine how high your interest rates are, you might be not only a family of terrorists, but also one of usurers. And when everyone knows where you are about to be sent, now, probably some of your victims will take heart, and will denounce the vilenesses you have committed in all these years. It's going to be an unrepeatable chance for them, if they decide to do so they won't owe you a cent anymore."

"Who has allowed you to insult us in this way? We're not criminals, you are!"

"I'm not the one insulting, at least not the only one. Can't you even realize what you're saying right now?"

"Well, maybe I've done that, but even in this case, don't you deserve it, then? You want to destroy Hinamizawa, our world, and you're cheeky enough to show yourself and claim you're a pure angel! What will become of all our people, haven't you thought about it?"

As answer, Nabiha went down the staircase again, stopping himself by Mion. Who began to shouting another time, menacing him and wishing the most painful death for him. She was out of control. Hearing those words, her opponent smiled, satisfied, and he pointed at some individual not far from them, perhaps the only ones who were still looking at them. They were taking pictures, writing on her notebook, talking to their portable tape recorders.

"You can recognize them, they are the journalists drawn here by your march. I am sure that you've asked them to come here, to underline the greatness of your demonstration, the importance of your family, and now they are the witnesses of your defeat. You're the one who has arranged it, and no one else. Who knows what are they writing, right in this moment... After seeing what you've done, after listening to your speech, full of anger and hatred as if those words belonged to a raving dog, and not to a civil woman... I can't wait to read their reports, you are destined to be the one wrong, there. And you should know how it works, all the medias now will describe you as the worst human being ever seen, and by reflex Hinamizawa's cause will be irremediably compromised. By drawing up this plan, you've dug your own grave, milady."

"You... You... I will never forgive you, I will be restless until you..."

"Good idea. Go on menacing me in front of them, you're helping me. That will do nothing but make your situation worse, like everything you have done until now, as a matter of fact." He was still smiling. His whole behavior, in that moment, had been studied to provoke her. That was why he had approached her again, previously, that was why he had been speaking with those exact words. And seeing her so desperately angry, looking for any loophole, was incredibly satisfying, it was the confirmation of the final result of that battle. He knew it, he had won.

The other members of the club, trying to support her somehow, all approached them, with angry looks. But their face showed also their awkwardness, their fear. They didn't know what to do, now. If only Keiichi's head had been fine... And behind them, the sense of bleakness was the same. Most of the crowd had already left the place, and in the middle of that avenue there were no more than 2.000 people left, namely Hinamizawa's population. They were looking at Mion and Nabiha, wordless and frightened, now, to see what their destiny was going to be. They were depressed.

"You are a criminal! You can't deny it!" Shion shouted, as to protect her sister "You have also killed that expert, to impede us from finding him and asking him for the true culprit's name! That's why he's nowhere to be found!"

"This is nothing but an unfair accusation, do you really think that I'd do such a foolishness, risking to ruin everything? I absolutely don't know what you're talking about." And after saying this, Nabiha turned his back on those youngsters, and he started going up the staircase.

"Go back here, Nabiha!" screamed Keiichi "We haven't finished yet!"

"We have, instead." he answered, while closing his eyes and commiserating them "I can't waste more time with you. Maebara-san, if you have other questions, the JOST's lawyers will be happy to answer to you... oh, sure, he won't, I was wrong. They are going to answer only to your friends, not to you, because you're not a free man anymore, starting from this morning. Sonozaki-sama" he spoke then to the prefect "Please do what you're supposed to. Waiting for more time would be a severe non-fulfillment of your duty."

After hearing this, the prefect looked at the ruler of his family, sorry and unable to find a solution. Mion, in that moment, had finally surrendered. She had failed, she felt like a completely useless idiot. _Batcha, Batcha... forgive me. _She closed her eyes and starting to cry desperately. But immediately after that, the others saw her turning completely pale and collapsing, and they understood what was happening. She was breathing compulsively, lying down on the ground, and her whole body was visibly trembling. At once Shion tried to help her sibling, calling her by name and lovingly smacking her, but she didn't recover. She was really sick.

"What is that... Epilepsy?" asked Keiichi, frozen. He stood there petrified for several seconds, until he was pushed away by Irie who had realized what Mion's conditions were and who had reached quickly the group, desiring to aid her. At once he asked Satoko to go to the restaurant in front of them, to look for some water to give to her friend, while Rena was sent to the the nearest public phone, to call for an ambulance. After having done so, he slightly lifted Mion's head, and he gave her his coat, to make her not suffer from coldness. Then, he said to reassure them: "Don't worry, she will be soon fine, this kind of attacks doesn't take too much time to finish."

Rika gazed at her friend. Her fateful fight had to have been an enormous source of stress, for her, and that anger was so similar to the symptoms caused by the L5 Hinamizawa Syndrome, she had seen them so many times in the past worlds. But what about that faint... She reflected then about what Irie had said about the side effects of the ATPC, and she tried to lock her eyes with him, to understand his point of view. Irie noticed it, and as answer he just shrugged, meaning that everything was possible, and that he would have searched for the truth later, that was not the most suitable moment for it.

Even Nabiha stopped himself, to look at her. He was a bit sorry to see her in that conditions. But, after all, that was a war, not a game. If he hadn't gone out of his way to be successful, he would have been a marked man. Keiichi called for him, ordering him to stay there, at least as sign of respect towards Mion, but he neither turned towards him, limiting himself to glance at the girl, and answering: "There is really nothing I can do for her. Moreover, she's recovering, as you can see by yourself."

He was right. Mion was slowly standing up, helped by her sister. Still, her glance was full of dejection. She was sure that her village had just been condemned, and she wasn't able to think about a solution. It was comprehensible, she had always been so. If in front of her there was a real way to face her problems, she was able to find a lot of unsuspected energy inside her, and she became a true leader, ready to guide her friends to the victory. After all, during the war against the Yamainu, in the beginning she was skeptical, but after hearing Keiichi and Satoko's plan to defeat them, she had been convinced, and she had done her best to make it become reality, with incredibly wonderful results. But, otherwise, if there was no way to escape from their fate, she began to stay motionless, keeping her look low, not being able either to talk and give a hand. And, unluckily, that was the case.

No, it couldn't end in this way. Rika was still ready to fight, she had handled so many deaths, so many cruel tragedies... She whispered "TIME, STOP!", to ask Hanyuu to freeze it. But her ancestor didn't obey to her. Rika looked behind her, surprised.

"H-Hanyuu, why are you refusing...?"

"Rika, I'm sorry to have done this, but what are you planning to do? Blocking everything for as much time as possible?"

"It's not only that, I want also to contrive a solution, somehow..."

"Rika, you should know it. I can freeze time for a period equal to 14.400 of my heart pulses, and under this effort it means twelve minutes, more or less. And then I have to wait for 1.440.000 seconds, before doing it again. Do you understand it now? Thinking alone, for such a short time... This kind of attempts will be useless, I fear. It's much better to ask the others for some suggestion. Keiichi-san and Mion-san's immediate destiny is to be put under arrest, but they won't be secluded, far from us. We will be allowed to talk with them, sometimes. They are still able to help us, even in a prison."

Rika gnashed her teeth, frustrated, but she had to admit that Hanyuu was right and that there was nothing else she could do for the moment. She raised her eyes to the sky, looking at Nabiha's back angrily. And doing that a surprise shocked her.

Hanyuu had not frozen time, but, on nearly half of the staircase, Nabiha wasn't moving.

* * *

**Author's note: Well, that's it. This first real attack by the antagonists of this story. After all, once someone wants to fight against Hinamizawa, he has to think about something to neutralize its famed Spirit. And, to do that, there are mainly two ways: keeping your attack secret (=Takano and the Yamainu), or dividing the community (=here). They have studied what happened during the Dam war, when a similar feud was about to happen by random, and they have taken advantage of this phenomenon. This is the meaning of the title, a well-known Latin locution which means "Divide and rule"**


	22. Nemesis

**22 – Nemesis**

_Okinomiya, 18th December 1983_

Nabiha looked at the top of the staircase, next to the entrance of the prefecture. There, someone had sat on the first step, as if he was waiting for him. Alone, separated from all the others. His black coat made him resembling to a dark spot on the white flight of steps.

The man observed his melancholic face, recognizing him: "Oh, this is a real surprise, my dear little_ gaijin. _When have you arrived there? I hadn't either noticed you, before."

Giancarlo didn't move, and he didn't say a word. He limited himself to sigh slightly, while hearing how the individual in front of him continued: "I'm sorry for the show these villains have offered to your eyes. They have caused serious damages to this prefecture, but fortunately they have only destroyed those rooms on the ground floor, the building itself won't risk too much. I'm an architect, so I am quite sure of it, the power of those bombs didn't look to be high enough, in my opinion. And I guess they were aware of it, too, they wanted to scare us, not to kill us and the evidence of this is the fact they hit those specific rooms: as far as I know, they were archive rooms, rather than real offices, so there were no people inside."

Nabiha smiled, then he went on again "But the worst thing has been to see them throwing all those stones, and towards a relative of one of their leaders, in addition... These demonstrations are always so hard to control, the prefect had waited one or two seconds too many, to answer to that brat's call, and as reaction they've committed that affront. Well, it's a sign of the irrationality of every crowd all over the world, don't you agree with me? You must have heard about a lot of similar incidents in your Country, and somewhere else, I guess."

That man couldn't stop speaking. He had been informed about everyone in Hinamizawa, and he knew that in a verbal fight the only one who really could interfere was Keiichi. But that aching wound on his head hadn't allowed him to do that. As for his companions and friends, they had not his same skill, or they were not aware of all the affairs inside the Sonozaki family. Nabiha was feeling quiet, the other one was carrying a sad and silent look, he wasn't representing a serious menace, and therefore he continued:

"That poor prefect, it must have been a trauma for him... He has seen the chief of his family coming to him, as they had presumably scheduled in the previous days, and suddenly the ones after her have attacked him with no forewarning. A vile betrayal, I'd define it, a prove of those yokels' incapability to see the consequences of what they due by instinct. But you know... I can slightly understand their point of view, finally. Formal agreements are a serious matter, and I don't think that a single official would have been sufficient to solve it, although that man's quite an authority. Theirs would have quickly become a national issue, with some backlash even on international relationships. You know, the most relevant part of our society keeps its base abroad. Asking for help to their relatives wouldn't have been enough, to those boys."

Giancarlo kept on staying quiet. In the meanwhile, a light chill breeze was rising.

"Aren't you speaking, are you?" concluded Nabiha "Yes, it's not a bad idea, I can comprehend it, your party has already spoken too much, today. Anyways, let's see... Should I point at someone who had thrown some of those stones? Maybe I should, as loyal citizen it's my duty. For example... Can you see her?" he showed a girl not far from them "She has been the last one who did it. I've seen her with my own eyes."

The other members of the club could hear what he was saying, and Shion turned her head towards that girl. "Yukiko-chan... have you really done that?" She knew her very well, in the past she had worked at the Angel Mort, with her.

And Yukiko lowered her head, confessing her fault and crying desperately. "I'm sorry, really, really. I've lost my mind, and I had seen others who were doing that, taking those kettles from that yard, so..." She covered her face with her hands, as if she was trying to hide herself.

Rika looked at that unlucky girl. She knew her too, she was from Hinamizawa, even if she attended Okinomiya's school, and she didn't meet her so often. Everyone knew her as a vivid girl, but not aggressive at all. And, in spite of this... Rika was nervous. _So, have we really made this disaster? Now she looks so depressed... Might it be an effect of the Hinamizawa Syndrome? But her neck has not scrapes._ No, probably the Syndrome hadn't not taken a part in it, her behavior had been due to her state of excitement, in that moment. Well, it didn't matter. Mion and Keiichi were going to take responsibility even of what Yukiko had done, they would have gone to prison to pay for what the others had committed. Rika was disappointed, really.

"You have told this only now, I see." finally spoke Giancarlo, calmly "I find it's very significant. Saying it before wouldn't have been counterproductive, you wanted to charge Mii-chan and Kei-chan, to give them all the responsibility."

"Oh, have you noticed it? Well, I didn't need to say that, before. But now, they definitely look as the criminals they really are, so I am not worried anymore about that."

Some second passed. Then Giancarlo asked, nearly softly: "I wonder why you have shown yourself here, today..."

Nabiha eyed the Italian boy. He looked so quiet, he wasn't angry. His approach was diverse from Mion's one. That foreigner simply didn't seem to care about what was about to occur: the policemen were going to follow his friends on the ambulance to the nearest hospital, to bring them to prison once they had been medicated. Talking with him wouldn't have been that exciting... he wasn't so interesting, as the others were.

"I'm sorry, but I have to go." Nabiha explained, while going up the last steps, and pushing the door to go inside the prefecture "In the very next hours I'm being terribly busy, all those villagers will come to me to sign the new contracts, so now I can't stay here with you, to reflect about what has happened here today. Who knows, maybe I've been too generous, but I might change my mind, and impose crueler conditions to them, if they don't hurry over accepting." He was not saying that only to the Italian boy, that was nearly an order he was shouting to all the remaining crowd, which was still listening.

"I know you want to use the back door to reach your car and go away from here safely." Giancarlo answered, while looking at him edgeways, without either turning his head. "Killing you wouldn't solve anything, you are only a sort of ambassador, here, but going through this crowd would be anyway very dangerous for you, even if they seem so wordless and still, now."

He was right. After hearing that their victorious opponent was inviting to his house, to sign as quick as possible their capitulation, nobody else was talking, now, they all had fallen prey to anguish, and they were looking at the staircase, motionless as soulless puppets.

"However" went on Giancarlo "I wouldn't go away, if I were you. You still have to defend yourself, and renouncing to do it could lead you to have shackles on your hands, very soon."

Nabiha turned himself, looking uneasy at that strange boy. _I can't lower my guard... He's acting so on purpose,_ he thought _He likely must have seen what has happened to Sonozaki-san before, and he might have learned his lesson._

"Should I defend myself from you, are you saying this? Please, then, continue."

"As you please." Giancarlo answered, talking to him as they were alone. It seemed that the others were not there anymore, for him. "You see, once they concluded that scholar was a criminal, the one who had suggested him to Kimiyoshi-san got consequently suspicious. But my sister Flavia told me that until now there hadn't been any true clue which might make them think of you as the main villain, so the police couldn't charge you with anything..."

"And they still can't. I've done nothing wrong, admit it."

"Later. Maybe."

Nabiha gazed at him. _Is he having fun with me? _He didn't like his unnaturally calm attitude, and he made another step to the door of the palace, but the boy's words blocked him.

"Well, probably you already know that, I have a part-time job. Exactly like you, I'm used to represent a foreign society, since I work for a little Italian cotton mill, so I usually focus on money... And I concluded this has been a wonderful business, for you. How much are you going to spend, for the village? Do you already know it?"

"Oh, surely a great amount of money, but I have not calculated it yet."

"Well, let's do it. Each family of farmers in Hinamizawa owns a field wide at least a couple of hectares, so the rice fields represent globally no less than five or six square kilometers. Let's add 700-800 houses, and the woods around them, which means other ten kilometers at least. Now, let's simplify, claiming that the worth of each house is ten millions of yens, while I'd evaluate each hectare of wood about one million, and each hectare of rice field about five millions. In the end, the prize to get both of Hinamizawa and its countryside is more or less 12-15 billions of yens."

Kimiyoshi froze, hearing those numbers. "How can that kid talk about _our prize_, in that way? He doesn't carry any respect for us, for our pain."

"Don't worry, Kimiyoshi-san." answered Alice. "Nii-chan looks so rude, sometimes, but he knows what he's doing, I can guarantee it." The others looked at her, she was smiling, but there was a sinister light, into her eyes. She started going up, slowly, to take part in the discussion between Nabiha and her brother, as if Giancarlo's spirit had been calling for her. At once Rena tried to follow her, but a voice blocked her. The same voice which had blocked her some hour before, when she had grabbed Rika.

"Ke-keresana-san, that's you."

"Indeed. Rena-chan, and all you others, you should stay here. You mustn't go up there."

"But they are..."

"I can see what they are doing. But you would only disturb them, if you joined them."

"But we are their friends, we are not going to disturb them at all! We always have fought together, we are used to do so!" exclaimed Rika.

"It's just the same. You may be both friends or strangers for them, they've not used to be in large groups, in these situations. Especially Giancarlo-kun. You would only distract him... you would annoy him."

"What do you mean?" asked Keiichi.

"It's simple. You have shown them how Hinamizawa fights its wars. Now it's time for him to do the same, and to fight as he knows. Just stay here and watch the show, it will be instructive,_ for better or for worse._"

"But... what will happen? Are they really able to..." Rika was worried, but Keresana didn't answer to her question. However, his melancholic look convinced somehow her not to interfere. She then nodded, raising her eyes, and looking in that direction. The atmosphere above there was surreal, and strangely this was making her calmer.

On the top of the staircase, Nabiha was still eying Giancarlo, trying to understand what that boy was aiming that. Then he answered: "Fifteen billions... It's possible. It seems reasonable to me. The Government, during the Dam War, had offered globally twenty or twenty-two billions, if I well remember. And they had refused, even if it was slightly more than the value of their goods."

"Well, good. You are going to spend that amount, and you'll be given the triple of it, so you're going to earn thirty billions. Astonishing, really."

"Go on..."

"Well... isn't it a bit too much? Namely, which private society is going to spend so much money for a single project?"

"..."

Giancarlo said nothing for the following minute, and finally Nabiha scratched his head.

"Well, maybe I've exaggerated, before. Seeing all those people angry towards me, in that moment, has made me too excited. However, they have given me the necessary money to buy the village, and I'll be extremely well paid, in the end. And, moreover, the sum of money involved in this story is still huge, and you can realize how the JOST will neither consider the chance to be stopped by some humble villagers."

Giancarlo smiled. He was looking to the ground now, ignoring the other one: "Well, I can see now why you didn't know the exact value of Hinamizawa: if it had been like what you had said to Mii-chan, you would have calculated it precisely, to find your future earnings, pushed by Greed; and you might have decided to give to the Hinamizawans more money than what you have offered, to increase the expenses and therefore earn more. Instead, you're simply going to be given a prearranged sum of money... Well, now we know that you've lied, before."

His opponent observed him, annoyed: "Are you saying I won't respect the proposal I've made, then? Once I've signed the definitive agreements, I will be obliged to do so, I am not simply giving my word."

"Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't intend to insinuate you are a mere liar. After all, when you had talked about what Yukiko-san had done, you were sincere, and we have easily checked that. Yes, you have been careful to tell the truth about what we could verify, and you have had fun scaring us, when you were talking about the other things. Oh, well. Previously, however, I wanted only to stress the fact you were going to become very rich, thanks to this _very_ lucky chain of events. And in exchange for it, you're paying only some figurehead. The famed expert, for example, or the ones who claimed to be your employees, and who had signed the starting contracts. And the ones you have gathered here today, and the other helpers of you..."

"Who are you talking about?"

"I'm sorry again, I should always start from the beginning. You know, I am not able to speak as fluently as Kei-chan, or Nee-chan. They are much more skilled than me, but now I'm here, and I'm the one on it."

"Well, if you need some help, you should have asked for it." Behind Nabiha, Alice was claiming for her part.

"Oh, I know my sister... However, if you want to have a role in this little party, for me it's fine, Alice." This was what he answered, going on staring at the steps he was still sat on, with his slightly opened eyes. "Well, let's see, Nabiha-san. I'm sure you have already noticed that little yard over there, next to the crossroad."

Nabiha didn't answer. They had hit a nerve.

"You see... There you can see some new barrow, and some other material... Now, there are much fewer stones than before, but it's the only difference, now the yard is like how we have found it, when we've arrived here. Yes, it's not easy to understand what they are doing, there is not any sign, either. In your opinion, what are they planning to do, there?"

"I don't know, they still have to start working, I'd say."

"You are right, but this yard is so small, with a so limited equipment, it must be a quick work, I guess. So, why they have already brought everything there, when it would have been simpler to do that the day of beginning of their works? Some vandal could always damage that equipment, and it would have been a pity, especially because it seems brand new."

"Then you're wrong, and they have already started working. But have you asked me to stay here to talk about yards, now?"

"Oh, have a bit of patience. They can't have already started, as I've said before it must be a quick job, achievable in no more than two days. If so, they would have used two consecutive ones, to get rid of the issue. Just like Monday and Tuesday, or Thursday and Friday... Saturday and Monday, as it would have been in this case, would have been very unusual. And the barrows are brand new, as I've just told, they have not used them yet for sure."

"You're getting on my nerves. So, in your opinion have they started or not?"

"Neither of them, in a certain sense. Consider the role of that place in this story. I suppose that who had organized this protest didn't expect to find a yard here, but they wouldn't have made a detour, going straight on till the prefecture would have made this demonstration a wonderful show, as a matter of fact. But that meaningless detail has become fundamental, when the multitude began to protest. Making us finding a near place where to take stones from... had been a real luck for you, if we can define it so."

Giancarlo paused, smiling, then Alice went on. She had understood what her brother was driving at. "Oh, I'm wondering... We're wondering about the real identity of who has asked for that yard to be placed there. There is only a vacated house, next to it, so it must be someone else. Hmmm... we'd be impolite, if we suppose it's you?"

Nabiha turned towards her, and he laughed. "Well, you can check it, there are no signs there, but they must have asked for the permission somewhere. And assuming that I had done that, how could I know the date of your march? I couldn't keep such a little yard open for the whole December without a good motive, it would have sounded suspicious, and they would have never granted to me the authorization."

"That wouldn't be strange if you asked a nominee to do it instead of you. About the day of the demonstration..." Alice, while saying it, looked at his brother, who completed her sentence:

"Today was the most probable day. It was reasonable that they would have arranged it on a Sunday, to gather more people, since a lot of them had not to work in these days. So, we have been aware of this affair since... 5th December, yes. On 11st we were still waiting for your employees to take care of that, as they had promised by phone. Next Sunday is Christmas Day, a lot of us would have been on holiday somewhere else, perhaps the prefect, too. And the following Sunday will be New Year's Day, the contracts the villagers had signed would have become effective, and it would have been too late for them."

"Ah-ha, Nii-chan, now I see why those employees had asked us to wait for some days, when they had been phoned the first time. They wanted to delete the 11st of December from this list of possible choices." Alice was even starting to amuse herself, now.

"But Serco-san, I could have never been sure of this. If you had wanted to do it on another day..."

"Nabiha-san" Alice answered "This was anyway the most reasonable choice, and you were ready to take advantage of it. However, if you had been wrong, those bombs would have been anyway there, ready to carry out their task."

"So, you are charging me...?" Nabiha was losing his self-control.

"...To be the real guilty of these incidents, yes."

"This is mindless!"

"Mindless? This is the worst word you could ever use. Nii-chan has in detail explained to you what has driven him to this conclusion, you had even told him he was boring, before..."

"___Forse tu non pensavi ch__'__io loico fossi__?*_" his brother added "After all, what's the sense of offering first the full value of their goods, then only a third of it and finally the full one again? It would have been easier to go for the last proposal immediately, a lot of them would have accepted without protesting... Unless your real plan here was to discredit Hinamizawa's Spirit, and the Sonozakis as well. Once all of those villagers had felt like dejected, that clan would have joined them, and the larger this crowd, the more terrifying their humiliation."

"Tsk, that girl, before, has admitted she was the culprit! She has thrown more than a stone!"

"She had admitted she had imitated someone else's behavior, which is different, extremely different." replied Alice "When you are in a shouting large group of people, when you don't understand what's happening exactly and you see the others yelling, and becoming violent, it's not so strange to follow their example. She has acted wrongly, I won't deny it, but I don't blame her for this. And moreover, copying someone means that this _someone _has been the one who has started it, and not Yukiko-chan. I wonder from who they were taking orders..." Her glance was perfectly explaining what she was meaning.

"And so? Do you know how much severe is your charge? I should write a letter to someone. I can see both of the prefect and the inspectress of the police station are friends of yours, but it won't be hard to find someone who cares about chasing away the annoying foreigners, you will be sent back to your miserable country earlier than you can imagine, and you're never going to be allowed to come here again..."

Giancarlo nodded, and Alice, noticing it, answered:

"We're ready for it."

"What?" Nabiha looked angry, for the fist time in that day.

"If it's necessary, we're facing this, we don't fear this menace of yours. But I don't think you're going to do it. Asking for help from someone important would be counterproductive for you, we could use your own move to make this story standing out even more than how much it is now. And that wouldn't be good for you, am I right?"

Nabiha didn't answer. He didn't know what to answer. He had studied the plan as deeply as possible, he had prepared each step of it, he had thought about what to answer to each attack. But he thought he had to face mainly the Sonozakis, not the two Sercos. And the moves effective against the former family were not so against the latter one.

Hence, the man tried to realize what was going wrong. The role he had imagined for himself was just like the one arranged initially for Keiichi by the Sonozakis. Like the boy, he had studied his part, his interlocutors' sentences were expected, and he knew what to rebut, and what to do. And, as Keiichi and Mion had run into those unexpected incidents, Nabiha had to face that sudden reaction, by someone he nearly didn't know. Like Keiichi, he was a good actor who didn't know how to respond in that situation. Namely, that fight was just like the one between Mion and he. But, this time, he was on the wrong side.

Alice noticed his confusion, and she smiled satisfied. It was the moment to clinch that match.

"Nabiha-san, what did you think the people in front of you were? When you face such a high number of people, alone, you always must take into account that someone is able to do something who can defeat you. Oh, you surely have been informed about all the dangerous inhabitants of the village, but you couldn't know everything about the ones arrived here last. You've studied the whole deck, but you've forgotten its two jokers."

Giancarlo looked at the two challengers, thoughtful. Alice had taken the control of the whole situation, and she was going on talking, to win, and save the village she was living in, now. She was even more strong than what she looked alike, and she knew what to say, she was not a bad speaker at all. Her help was necessary, and she would have never lost, certainly. Somehow, he started envying her future husband. However, that last metaphor... _She must have created it in her mind while thinking about all the activities of the club, analyzing each sign on the cards is vital, there. Well, I don't dislike it, after all, jokers are used only in special events, they are not normal cards... But if so, Alice is not a Joker. She settled in the village so well, she's so happy here. She has her own behavior, but there's no way she's unrelated to the other cards of the deck. I wouldn't be wrong if I claim I am the only Joker of Hinamizawa's Deck, here. But if so... who is the other one? There are no games with only one of them, I guess."_

Giancarlo knew how everything would have ended. He decided not to speak anymore, and he wasn't interested in what Nabiha was saying, now: "I'm tired of hearing you charging me. So, have you any evidence? Otherwise, I'm going to leave immediately, and we'll see if you have fun again while kidding me."

"Oh, my" Alice answered "You have lost your mind, now. You have just said the classical phrase which every criminal says in the end of every detective story. However, I'm going to be more original than their usual protagonists... Are you asking me for evidence? I'm answering that I don't even need it."

"Jeering at me won't save you from..."

"I'm not joking. This is a square, full of people, not a court, and evidence are not so necessary. Have you forgotten the ones you were pointing at before?" she indicated the journalists, who were still there, attracted by that strange show. "Think about it only for a moment, what are they writing now? About the incidents, indeed... but I'm not absolutely sure that they will focus on the Sonozakis, now, here they have just met someone much more interesting. There are so many clues and questions about you, and your behavior is objectively generating a lot of doubts about your role in this affair. Their readers will be happy to be informed about what are you doing, they always like this genre of stories, full of mysteries, intrigues and disturbing details... Mii-chan and Kei-chan are not the monsters of this story, that part belongs to you, and thanks to you everyone will know it."

Hers was only a bluff, finally, they couldn't have any evidence, they hadn't either time to look for them. However, Alice was sure it would have worked, and, to scare Nabiha even more, she looked down at her friends, nodding and raising theatrically her arm. Satoko immediately understood what she wanted them to do.

"Buuuuuuu, go away, monsteeeeerrrr!" she shouted, at the top of her voice. The other members of the club quickly followed her, and then the whole crowd did the same. Now everyone was contesting him, charging him to be a heartless man, a criminal, a potential murderer too. And this time it was very different from before, since there seemed to be a real reason for claiming it, now. Theirs was an endless noise, something Nabiha couldn't bear anymore... Alice was reviving Hinamizawa's Spirit, like a phoenix rising again from its ashes.

Giancarlo looked down at the others, for a moment. _I had completely forgotten about them, it was like they didn't exist, for me... If it hadn't been for Alice, they couldn't have helped us. For how much time have they stayed there, without saying a word? No... maybe they have talked a lot, but I haven't noticed it. It's always the same story, I've ignored them. _It wasn't true, they had just observed them wordless for the whole time, while being worried but admiring them a few, but he couldn't be aware of it.

Then he observed Nabiha, he was sweating, now. That kind of terror must have been the same feeling lived by the other members of the club. _He's just a puppet, finally. They taught him a part, and he was only able to play it partially. This story is not finished, yet._

Anyway, their opponent had just got out of control, as if he had surrendered. Alice's bluff had been successful.

"You can't say I'm a terrorist, I've not killed anyone! I-I-I could have ordered them to bring grenades instead of stones, if I had wanted to kill you!" After finishing speaking, Nabiha froze, realizing the mistake he had just made.

"Well, you are confessing it, now, everyone has heard you. You wanted to look like a hero who face his overwhelming enemy, and wins, am I right?" said Alice "Earlier our charges sounded fake to everyone's ears, so you were that calm, before. But now... Your sense of honor won't be able to face the reality."

"No, wait, I can still defend myself. E-even now I've just said I didn't want to harm anybody."

Giancarlo made the gesture to rotate his hand, and Alice showed to have understood his hint: "I can't know if you're doing this because you truly cared about our safety. Anyways, you had good reasons to do that. Firstly, using too powerful bombs would have forced the prefect to make evacuate the building, and you wouldn't have been allowed to stay here and speak. But, most of all, if someone had been killed, there would have been a deep inquiry, and maybe they would have discovered some singularity in your version of the events. With no casualties, instead, everything would have ended soon, and with the best ending for you. To make sure to avoid unexpected deaths, I suppose that early in this morning someone has come to the prefecture, placing the bombs and locking the archive rooms you were going to make burst, maybe with a Master Key. Today is Sunday, and this building is nearly empty..."

"H-how can you know that?"

"Come on, if you pretend to save our lives you _have_ to consider this, somewhat... And it's hard to find another way to use those bombs without harming anyone."

Alice stopped speaking, staring at her opponent, who was looking on the ground, unfulfilled. The Italian girl started walking to reach the prefect, to invite him to do what it was necessary, but, to do that, she had turned her back on Nabiha, and she quickly realized it had been a mistake. Suddenly, an unexpected fist hit her on her nape, and she risked to fall off the staircase. Fortunately, she was fast enough to grab the railing, and she quickly turned angrily towards the responsible.

"You, little bitch!" shouted Nabiha "Why don't you get out of my way, and go and drop dead somewhere? You'd make me a real pleasure!" He began to approach her, menacingly.

"We must help her!" yelled Shion, getting aware of what was happening. All of them started running up, but they stopped at once. Coming from above them, they could perceive clearly a terrifying dark aura, which was inviting them to stay far from their friends. A strong sense of pain, sorrow and fear filled their hearts and their body, paralyzing their legs and their arms, and nearly forbidding them even to breath, as if the doors of Hell had been opened, and all the Evil of all the worlds they had lived in were present in that exact point. Rika kept a hand on her chest, feeling like they were ripping off her heart, and she asked herself what was happening there. _It's... it's so strong that we've all noticed it, not only I. _She swallowed with great effort, she couldn't believe to what she was seeing. In that moment, that appalling aura wasn't their enemy. It didn't belong to Nabiha, on the contrary he was its target, and perhaps he had neither got it.

Above their friends, on the top of the staircase, Giancarlo had interposed between his sister and that man, and now he was eying him, full of wrath.

For a moment, Nabiha was uneasy. There was something strange in him "I was sure his eyes were lighter..." Then he took courage, and he exclaimed: "Then, little bastard, what are going to do, now? Are you going to protect you lovely sister?"

He laughed, taking a knife from his jacket. "Do you like it? This weapon is five centuries old, my ancestors have given it to me, to bring my family back to the role we deserve. They've engraved my destiny on this blade."

Nobody answered, so he was induced to go on: "But you, stupid westerners without honour, you can't understand this. Did you really think money was the only reason? You morons. Once this story is going to finish, everyone will respect me and my family, as they respect the Sonozakis, no, _more_ than the Sonozakis! Are you thinking I was envious? Sure, I was! They have stolen our role, before the last World War they were nothing, and suddenly they've started to be important, while we have been forgotten! But now, but now..."

Nabiha was going mad, it was obvious. He knew that his fate wouldn't have become what he had wished, but he couldn't accept it, and he was ready to bring as many people as possible to his same damnation. Still, Giancarlo was not answering, and Alice was just saying: "Nii-chan, please..."

Her brother shook his head, and finally he whispered, nearly voiceless: "_Nabiha, you've done something you hadn't had to do._"

"What?"

Giancarlo didn't answer, again. He was now looking at him, his eyes inexpressive and dull like the ones of a statue. He walked towards him, and he said, with a nearly expressionless voice:

"Nabiha, how can you even dare talking about honour, after what has happened? You've claimed you wanted nobody to be killed, but are you really sure it has ended so?"

His enemy didn't reply, so Giancarlo invited him to go down, pointing at the burst rooms. "You probably haven't noticed it, you were so proud to go up, and show yourself powerful like a God, but straight after the explosions, someone has entered into those archive rooms, and has made a bad discover."

"Are you..." Nabiha was in a cold sweat.

"Oh, don't you trust me? Well, you can check my words. Go down and enter the first burst archive room. You'll find a sheet, and a corpse under it, there. Have you realized what I am driving at, now?"

"No, it's impossible... and haven't they called for an ambulance? They are..."

"Just look at what is left of her face, and you'll understand why they haven't made it. You can deduce she was a young woman only by observing her clothes, and the rest of her corpse. Probably she had been locked inside thanks to your brilliant brainwave, and she was very next to your bomb when it exploded, we will never know why." He could also say that she had not suffered for sure, and that she had died at once, but he didn't. Nabiha had attacked his sister, and now Giancarlo wanted his inner pain to be as unbearable as possible.

"N-no... I had promised to myself that..." The knife fell from his hands.

"That what? That you would have been a hero like the one of a cartoon? Did you really pretend that spilling nobody's blood would have kept your soul pure, in spite of earning a fortune thanks to the others' disgrace? Please, don't annoy me with such a fool idea. You have neither controlled if everyone was fine, you couldn't wait for starting the show, am I maybe wrong? And so, you haven't seen that the ambulance arrived to cure Mi-chan and Kei-chan is taking care of that woman's corpse – oh, here they are, coming out of from the room right now."

Nabiha turned pale, while watching the scene, and looking at the leaving ambulance: "But... Your... Your friends, they didn't do it, too! They were busy on talking with me!"

"Oh, yes, you have realized it, too... You're right, absolutely." Giancarlo turned towards the members of the club, and they could look at his glance, full of anger. "What have they done for her? Nothing. I don't pretend their duty to be to save her life, it wouldn't have been possible, but noticing what had happened, at least, and dedicating a thought to her... Well, she didn't live in their village, after all, the famed Hinamizawa's Spirit saves its inhabitants, but it doesn't care at all about the others, I guess. However, you are worse than them, Nabiha, you are the one who has killed her."

_Is he really Gi-chan?,_ thought Rika. _I can't figure whether he's on our side or not... __How... how can a silent and quiet boy become so cynical and full of wrath?_ Then she tried to answer: "I'm sorry for having not noticed her. I'm going to apologize to her family, to make amends for my sin."

"And you, Nabiha, what are you doing? Being under arrest for the rest of your life, or do you prefer your soul to be cursed for the whole eternity?"

"Stop blaming me so! What have you done for her, then?" It was Nabiha's last attempt of defense, which quickly fell.

"Where do you think I was, when you were playing your show?" Giancarlo was going on staring at him, as a vengeful spirit which was condemning him. Nabiha couldn't afford that accusing glance anymore, and he knelt, starting to pant painfully. He said nothing from that moment on, and he was forced to hear what that Angel of Darkness was telling him.

"Please, don't try to avoid your sin crying like a baby, now. You are adult, so take responsibility for what have you done, even if this won't save you from the depths of Hell. You're going to be so funny, your remorse and your malaise will go after you, until the end of your days. You will never sleep quietly, from now on, and you're going to look desperately for your death, even if it will bring you from a little cell to the eternal damnation."

Nabiha was feeling terribly cold. His pant became convulsive, he was squat on the ground, crying.

"Oh, but the funniest thing will be what will remain of your so-called honour, the thing you claimed to care about the most... It's amazing, you have completely destroyed it, your family will be force to walk outside while being blamed, and cursed by everyone else. You were from Okinomiya, if I well remember, they'll all know about this story. Yes, your parents will repudiate their son, apologizing for their mistake, your brothers, your sisters, your wife, your sons and daughters, everyone will cry and be tormented by what you have done, and for the rest of their existence they'll do nothing but praising God to be killed, and not to live within this nightmare you've led them into!"

Nabiha vomited, disgusted by that destiny, while still crying bitterly, and leaning his head on the floor.

"Ah, I was forgetting... What will happen, now? Your beloved JOST won't surrender, but they won't forgive you for your failure. You're going to be killed, maybe your destiny will be the same of that famous expert's one. Do you think you can escape from them? It would be interesting to know what you have in that brainless head of yours. Well, can't you answer, now. _You, I'm talking to..._"

"Now stop."

Giancarlo sensed a hand on his shoulder. He turned quickly towards its owner: "RENA! How dare you..." The girl could have a close look at his raging eyes, now. But she wasn't scared, she knew what to do to calm him. She pointed at Nabiha, and said: "It's over. You don't need to go on anymore, now."

The Italian boy observed the one who once was his enemy. He couldn't be defined so, now. He was nearly flat on the ground, without even daring to look at someone, and his own vomit had stained his hair and face. The fears, the shadows inside his soul had been awakened, and now they were tormenting him.

"Have I... really reduced him so?" Giancarlo asked, as if he didn't remember it.

"He will be fine, soon, I'm sure of it." added Rena "We'll make him recover from this breakdown, and I'm sure you want to help us to do it. However, let's stop this fight, OK?" she smiled, and the one she was talking to quieted.

Giancarlo looked around. The whole club was next to him, and Alice was by Satoko and Satoshi. She was trying to hide the truth, but some tear had fallen on her cheeks, which had got red. And the whole crowd was looking at him, wordless. He felt ashamed for himself, closing his eyes full of remorse._ I've made her cry. I am a monster. I am an idiot. I've made her cry. I am a monster. I am an idiot. I've made her cry. I am a monster. I am an idiot. I've made her cry. I am a monster. I am an idiot..._

"Please do what is necessary, I have to go." After lowering his look, he went down the steps, and he walked fast among the others, desiring nothing but to leave the place. While doing this, the others could hear him repeating an Italian word. _"Scusatemi."_

"Ali-chan, what does that word mean?" Rika had asked for it, but somehow she already knew the answer. Alice, in fact, said slowly what she was expecting.

"Well... It means... _I'm sorry._"

…

"_For better or for worse._.. Now I understand Keresana-san's words." Rika looked at Alice, who had been joined by Flavia, and who explained:

"I don't know if I should look for him, to be honest. Leaving him alone could be the wrong choice... but if I start looking for him, he could become even more embarrassed, he could feel like a kid who always needs help. He has always had his head screwed on, I don't think he will commit a folly, but..."

"We should go for him, I'd say." replied Keiichi. "I can understand how his mood is, but we can't forget him. Alice, do you want to come with me? And you others, are you joining us?"

"No, wait, Kei-chan." answered Mion, who was feeling better now. "We have still a lot of things to arrange, and I'd like you to..."

"I know it, but this is more urgent, we can take care of the other things later. Let's go, now."

Mion was not that happy, hearing that answer. _Why are you leaving me alone, Kei-chan...?_ _I need you, and... _Suddenly, a revelation appeared in her mind.

_Sure, I see it. In these days he has helped me, he has been irreplaceable, I couldn't have got through this period, without him. I thought it would have been the beginning of our life together, we all thought so... Shion had even invited me to arrange my marriage, and she was doing it not only to tease me. But today he has saved Rena-chan's life, risking even to die, and leaving me alone in that chaos. Now he wants to look for Gi-chan... But so... He's helping us because we are his friends. He cares about all of us, and he'd offer his life to assist us, but only as friends, only as friends... And therefore, for him, am I nothing more than a friend, too? Nothing more than the president of the club he attends? We were all talking about our engagement at home, Shion and Mom were so excited... But Kei-chan had never discussed with us about the matter, and not because of shyness. But it's not his fault. Has anyone asked him about his real feelings? No, Shion hasn't, Mom hasn't, I haven't. Oh, my, I've been so stupid... during all this period I was afraid that Rena could bring him far from me, but he seems not to love neither of us, in the end. After all, he had already shown it no more than a month ago, when I had accepted Rena-chan's challenge, and finally Kei-chan hadn't chosen a girlfriend... I can see it, now, Kei-chan is the greatest friend imaginable, but he's not the best of the boyfriends. I wonder if Rena-chan had already realized this, when she had asked him to join us at home..._

She had to hide those thoughts quickly. The prefect was explaining to the others that finding Giancarlo would have been nearly impossible, he had gone away through the crowd, and they didn't knew which way he was following now. The best choice was to wait simply for him at their house: if he really was the judicious boy described by Alice, they wouldn't have had to be that worried.

"Judicious... Humph. This old lady is not surprised that he has run away. He has used the rage inside him to overwhelm Nabiha-san, and he has deliberately avoided to avail of us. And this is the result. I don't like this way to act, your destiny will be always regretting what you do. He has been lucky, Nabiha-san has committed deadly mistakes, too, his obsessive desire to be in the limelight has been his condemn. It would have been enough for him to make us be arrested, and then go immediately away. The whole day has not been anything special, in the end." Her previous thoughts had put Mion in a bad mood, but this was not the only reason of her hypercritical attitude. Her family hadn't been able to save their own village, and someone else, alien to the Sonozakis, had to take the control of the operation. She was a bit disappointed by this result.

"That is not his real character." protested Alice, to defend her brother "Nabiha-san had hit me, and his aggressiveness has led Nii-chan to that reaction. He only cares about his family... He wouldn't behave so to his friends. Unfortunately, when he gets that angry, his great grandfather's blood makes itself heard."

"Your great grandfather? Are you talking about some strange influence coming from dead ancestors, now?" commented Mion, annoyed.

"Oh, no... you know, when we were born he was still alive, he died when we were four. Well, our parents and grandparents had got married when they were young, so it had been possible."

"You have been lucky then, you have known even him..."

"_No, we hadn't._" Alice lowered her head, while a new tear appeared "_Our great grandpa had not been a good person._"

"What..." the others looked at her.

"Oh, nothing", she smiled, raising her eyes again. "I shouldn't offend dead people, and this story belongs to the past. By the way, what is it going to happen, now? Could you clear my head?"

"As you wish... Nabiha-san wanted to make us be described like monsters, but he has become the victim of his own trick. Well, we can go ahead with our aim, and cancel these contracts, we can say there is a 99% chance that everything will be fine again by the end of the month."

"These are really good news, Uncle Saborou" answered Shion "However, since our original plan was to crown Kei-chan as real leader and guide, we will ask those journalists not to write everything about this very last part of the demonstration. They will be free to paint Nabiha-san as they please, but the hero is going to be Kei-chan. We're not asking them to totally misrepresent the truth, they would likely defy us in that case, but only to omit a trifling detail... This is the importance of sponsoring most of the newspapers of the zone..."

Mion nodded, and Alice replied "I agree about your idea, Nii-chan will appreciate it too. He doesn't like to be at the center of attention." Everyone in Hinamizawa would have been aware of the truth, they were present, but the others would have thought that the march had ended as planned, and the prefect would have been allowed to fulfill the Sonozakis' requests.

"However" added the prefect "Besides what you have proposed in the beginning of our meeting, we will gather more information about this society called JOST. Showing them that we are ready for a new assault will discourage them to try another attack. We won't be caught unawares, next time."

"Good... Ah, changing the subject, how can they have placed those bombs there?" asked Satoko.

"Rena had looked inside, when I was next to the window... There was a clock on the table inside the room, and it was displaying a countdown, at least this is what Rena thinks, this is."

"A clock on the table... Hmm... was it a square, dark blue one, displaying white numbers?" The prefect looked a bit uneasy: "Well, they are the clocks we usually avail of, here. They must have tampered them, which is not improbable, because we were doing up those rooms, and nobody would have noticed a clock missing for some minute. It's quite embarrassing to say so, but they have demonstrated that the level of security here is too low. The person in charge of it will answer for this, but now I'm going to make check the other clocks inside the building, and, most of all, I must verify the identity of the woman involved in the first explosion." His expression became serious "I fear that she's one of the workers inside the prefecture, and it's my duty to communicate it to her family, if this is the case."

After saying this, he left them, pushing slowly the door and going inside the building. He seemed tired and disappointed. It had been a painful piece of news for him, knowing that one of his collaborators had died in the prefecture, because of something that might have been avoided. The others observed him, full of respect towards him for his strong sense of duty. Yes, in the end they had won that battle, but there hadn't been a happy ending for everyone. Then, Satoko broke the silence, again:

"Ah, sure. Rena-san, you were next to the window, as you had said. But why were you there? Why hadn't you run away?"

"Oh, Rena hadn't told you yet, you're right... You know, someone had pushed me, I'm sure of this."

"Someone? Who?" Satoko asked, and Rena answered, telling them the story of the letter she was given, and the cuttings inside it. While she was finishing, the others turned serious. That was a hard period, so they had understood why her friend had revealed that matter only to the Sercos. Now, however, the menace brought by the JOST looked farther, so they could help her effectively. And there had been a real attempt to kill her, therefore the law allowed Flavia to create a real protection program: two policemen would have escorted her, and, to support her, at least a member of the club would have followed her everywhere. Shion proposed that more than one member at a time should have done it, she wanted to avoid that Keiichi and Rena remained alone, fearing her sister's jealousy. But she got surprised, when she heard Mion answering that it would have been just the same, without even blushing. _What's happening?... There is something wrong, here_, she thought. She would have questioned her for it at home.

Finally, Flavia asked Rena to lend her coat to her, giving hers in exchange for it: "If someone has really pushed you, there is an extremely high chance that we'll find his fingerprints on it. Just wait a day or two, and I'll give you an answer."

…

While the others were trying to support each other, Giancarlo was alone, again, lost in his thoughts. He was going at home on foot. It would have taken more than two or three hours to reach it, but that image wasn't the one scaring him. He was afraid of another thing, rather. He had realized to know only a way, to go from Okinomiya to Hinamizawa, and he had obligatorily to walk through it. The others, while going back, would have easily found him, and he was terrified by that outlook. But he couldn't change the path, he would have risked not to find the right way anymore.

"I... I don't want to meet them, at least not today." He thought aloud "I want to stay alone, for now." The Sun had already disappeared, it was nearly 4 PM, and daylights was beginning to leave that land, as it always does there, in winter and at that time. The temperature had not become too low yet, anyway, so he could go on walking without freezing, in the meanwhile; he would have arrived at home not earlier than three hours later, when everything around him was about to be dark, but that was meaningless.

"I... Can I really dare judging the others, like what I've done before? Nabiha-san had been a fierce enemy, but he had shown some mercy, when Mii-chan had fallen because of that sort of epileptic attack. Instead, I've gone on attacking until Rena had stopped me. If she was not there, I might have become even more..." he shook his head, closing his eyes and trying to forget it.

"But, now, what can I say to Alice? I've... I've made her cry. I know how much she hates this behavior... I know how much he hates me, when I am so. I wouldn't like to meet her tonight, but I can't avoi..." A vehicle horn interrupted his inner speech. And a voice was calling for him: "Niiiii-chaaaaan!"

Giancarlo turned his eyes. He was used to that appellation, but this time it hadn't been spelled by his sister. An old grey car stopped by him, and inside three people were looking at him.

"Do you need a lift?" asked the old man driving it.

"Well... yes, please. But who are you? I don't think I've ever met you." he looked at the back seat, and he saw somebody he already knew. "You... You are the kid who had lost his parents..."

"And you're the foreigner who has put me on his shoulders, to help me." The kid smiled radiantly, amused by that new meeting "Please, get in our car, it will be funny to go home together." Giancarlo accepted, and the car restarted traveling.

The little kid couldn't help not to stare at their guest, and finally he asked: "I don't know even your name. The others had said your surname was Serco, but they didn't say your real name..."

"W-well... My name is Giancarlo, nice to meet you." He smiled, entertained by that airiness.

"Ghiannaro?" he tried to repeat it.

_And fortunately I've not told him my full name... _"No, listen to me carefully, I've not said _Ghiannaro_, but _Giancarlo_. But if you prefer so, you can call me Gi-chan, or Nii-chan."

"Ghi..."

"_Gi_, not _Ghi_."

"Gi... Gia... Too hard. OK, Nii-chan will be fine." he answered, while his parents on the front seats were laughing. "Instead, my name is Koji, and they are Mom and Dad."

"We are Shiro and Yume Tatewaki, pleased to meet you." explained the woman in front of him. "You see, we've already been told about you and your family, strangers often make headlines here, but until now we neither knew your exact name, we don't come to the center of the village to hear the last news, usually."

"But are you from Hinamizawa, too?"

"Not precisely. Maybe you have never met us, we live in an isolated house not far from Hinamizawa. Do you know, that old one close to the river, which you can see once crossed the bridge..."

"Oh, that gray building? I've got it. I'm supposing that Koji-kun goes to Okinomiya's school, then, you don't live far from it."

"Yes, you're right. We are borderline villagers, to tell the truth. Formally, we live in Hinamizawa, but we usually go to Okinomiya to do nearly everything. We go to the center of the village only for special events, like the recent councils."

They talked for a dozen of minutes about the most various subjects. Then, suddenly Giancarlo asked, becoming melancholy: "Please, be sincere... You have been in that square until the end, I suppose... Do you think I've caused such a huge disaster?" He was about to cry, and he wouldn't have been able to stop himself. But a surprising answer made him astonished.

"Disaster? Why?" answered Koji, made curious, then he added enthusiast "You've been incredible! He was so scary, but you have been so strong! A real fury, an invincible warrior! I'd like to be really like you, once I grow up!"

"R-really?"

"Oh, sure" added his father "You can't know it, but I was one of the farmers who had signed those famous contracts."

Giancarlo eyed him, surprised, while he went on: "Yes, I've been a moron, I won't deny it. And we are always advised to read every note on those damned sheets of paper... But, when they had told me about the landslide which was supposed to happen, I got scared as a little baby. I had to think about my family, especially now that my wife is pregnant, Koji will have a brother or a sister, soon."

"Oh, congratulations. To tell the truth, I hadn't noticed it, he's going to be born next summer, I guess."

"Yes, he's going to come into light in June. And, in spite of my effort, I was condemning them to a miserable life. When I've heard that guy speaking, I decided not to trust him, he claimed he would have paid us, but I'm sure he would have found a way to deceive us another time. What would have happened, without your attendance?"

"I wouldn't know what to answer..."

"Neither I. But something bad, for sure. We wouldn't have been paid a cent, I feared. Then, does it really matter, if you had been a bit too rude? It's understandable, and you've said only things I agree about. And as for your friends, they are aware that you have harshly scolded them, but they know also that your behavior was well-meant, and they won't mind it that much. You don't hate them for sure, you wouldn't have helped them, otherwise..."

"Well, for sure I don't hate them, indeed..." Giancarlo thought about what he was told, and finally he smiled: "Well... helping Koji-kun has been the best choice of the day, after all."

"Hmm, why?" the kid asked.

"Because" he answered, pulling friendly his nose "If you say I've behaved well, I'll believe to you..."

"Ouch! Let me go!" Koji smacked him, and once free he got even with him, laughing amused. So, while being tortured, Giancarlo thought relieved: _Well, I don't know if I've really behaved so well, but in every civil society we can clarify our acts, and this is what I'm doing. Tonight, at home, and tomorrow, at school. They'll understand._

* * *

* "___Forse tu non pensavi ch__'__io loico fossi__?"_ (literally, "Maybe hadn't you imagined I was a logician?") is a line from Dante Alighieri's _Inferno_ (XXVII, 123). It refers to a sentence said by the devil, who, after having been able to defeat Francis of Assisi thanks to his use of logic, had been allowed to drag Guido of Montefeltro's soul to Hell, and, while doing it, he had jeered at his victim, saying these words.


	23. The shards of Pandora's box

_**23 – The Shards of Pandora's Box**_

_Okinomiya, 19th December 1983_

It was a cold afternoon, as usual in Okinomiya's winter. Being far from sea didn't help the temperature to be pleasant enough, and you could even see one or two ice stalactites going down from the roofs of some house, mostly the oldest ones, or the abandoned ones. No pedestrians dared appearing outside, they all were using their cars, or rather they were availing of the public transport, even for the shortest journeys. It was not a period for romantic walks, getting a bad flu wasn't the best demonstration of love.

In spite of this, the storekeepers of the city didn't think that coldness was a bad thing, customers were tempted to go in their shops, to have a look and warming a bit. And this was what Alice and Rena did, that afternoon. They had entered _The Hidden Cove_, the Keresanas' cafe, to wait for Giancarlo, who had to take his family's car and drive them towards the Police Station of the city, which was quite far from there. Alice, in particular, wanted to avoid to walk outside, with that low temperature.

Rena looked at the table next to theirs. Two officers were drinking a hot coffee, while keeping a watch on them. They were there because of the protection program Flavia had prepared for her. They were quiet, and this made her less nervous. But, still, she was feeling uneasy, due to that situation. She was used to stay alone at the pit, and seeing all those people there because of her was not the most pleasant view she might have. Well, there was nothing she could do, nothing but waiting. She hoped there were important news from the Station, and it was plausible, if Flavia wanted her there she had to have something very important to say, a turning point. _There were really fingerprints on my coat, then soon..._

No, she couldn't be that nervous, she had not to be in a hurry, now. She couldn't just sit and wait for a nice and quiet future while doing nothing, but she hadn't to waste everything with that behavior either, and she was not feeling so uncomfortably there, after all. She was next to a friend in a calm environment, now, and she had already got acquainted with those officers, they were kind people, finally they had reached the cafe thanks to their car, and they had sometimes a dialogue with them. Unfortunately, they had had to stop, before, Alice had suddenly remembered that they had to withdraw Flavia's car from the garage, her sister would have not forgiven such a lapse, and since she had not her driving license inside her wallet, she had sent her brother, slightly reluctantly. She'd have liked to keep him and Rena alone in the cafe, instead of that. And so, Rena herself could see Alice was a bit disappointed, but she didn't know why. Or, in order to be more exact, she was starting to realize the reason of her behavior, but she wasn't sure, yet. _I should ask her, one day._ But, in the meanwhile, she was looking at the clientage inside the room.

"There are many more customers than the first time we were here..." she noticed.

"Yes, it's true. Nii-chan and I have given them some advice to increase their profits. You know, the _Angel Mort_ concurrency would be overwhelming, usually, so we've suggested them a different approach. Something next to a cultural club, rather than a noisy pastry shop. A very quiet place where old people can have pleasant dialogues, and Keresana-san is so happy to have so many new friends to talk with. But it's not only a place for old men, you can see some young girls over there, and someone else. This cafe can become also a quiet room to study, you just have to avoid to disturb the others."

"I see. Well, Rena understands your point of view. The _Angel Mort _is full of customers, but most of them are young boys attracted also by... Well, Rena shouldn't be that mean."

"It's all fine, Rena-chan." The door of the cafe had been opened, and two girls came in "I know about their abnormal attitude, after all I worked there, for a while. None of us will blame you if you tell the simple truth."

"Shii-chan, that's a surprise! And Satoko-chan too... But Satoshi-kun? It's so strange he's not with you. Where is he?"

"Oh, Nii-Nii should arrive in a few moments, Kasai-san has sometimes fun with him."

Alice could easily imagine the real kind of that amusement, and how that amusement itself was not precisely so for Satoshi, but she didn't say anything about it. Instead, she answered: "So Kasai-san has been the one driving you here... And what about the others? Have they stayed in Hinamizawa's school?"

"Well... In reality no, they haven't, but they are not far from there. Irie-sensei has asked them to reach him at his Clinic, and theirs didn't sound a quick matter."

"I see..." Rena lowered her head, worried. "Rena thinks he wanted to talk about yesterday, about Mii-chan's panic attack... Do you think so too? Do you?"

Most of them nodded. "It would be quite weird, otherwise. But they are going to have a talk with the prefect soon, surely. I fear... that Irie-sensei wants to make sure about Onee's state of health. When she has fainted... we all were terrified that might be an effect of that APTX, or whatever is its name."

"It's called ATPC, Shii-chan. However" Alice told "I hope it's just a sort of check-up, and nothing else. Today she really looked fine..." They all laughed, thinking about what had happened in the morning. Once come in the classroom, the first thing she did was grabbing Giancarlo's right arm, and flinging him to the ground, with one of her most dreadful moves. It was a way to restore real hierarchy between them, she had claimed. She was the ruler there, as she had shouted while bursting into laughter as her usual, and he was not allowed to take those initiatives without asking for her permission, before.

"Well, she didn't need to do that." exclaimed Satoshi, who had been able to survive to Kasai's cares and to join them. "I don't think that boy is that genre of leader, he's completely different from her."

"Nii-Nii is right" sneered Satoko "She has given him such a bad thrashing that he has held his right arm for two or three minutes, because of the pain... Her move has definitely been terrific! So, we must make other hypotheses. Maybe... did the doctor want to know what they were going to do, too?" She turned her eyes towards Shion, who answered:

"It's possible. Yesterday evening Onee has officially thanked Kei-chan for what he has done, and she has allowed him to go to his house, tonight." She lowered her eyes "Mom and I have got shocked when we heard her, but she is the chief, and furthermore Kei-chan hasn't had anything against it, he looked nearly relieved, as if the affair with the JOST was the only reason making him live with us... I wonder what has gone wrong, between them..."

Nobody answered, immediately. They knew Shion was very disappointed by her sister's behavior, but at the same time she was feeling sorry for her. After all those months, when Mion had talked about Keiichi, about how much he was _interesting_, and about the doll he had given her... _That one was perhaps the happiest day in all her life, it really seemed so. Till that moment, she feared to have behaved just like a tomboy, someone who would have never loved by anyone, and she sometimes even started crying, while confiding it to me. That day, instead, she was so happy, she hoped to have a real chance... Maybe in this period she had to behave differently, and Kei-chan didn't like it? Would she have to look always like a hoyden, then? No, it's not possible, that situation required a great seriousness, she couldn't pretend to ignore it, and Kei-chan must have understood that. So what..._

Finally, Shion added something else, aloud: "Well, maybe they have been surprised by what has happened. That strange boy had to take control of the situation, I'd say, like a substitute leader, or a similar thing. Yes, that must be so, that's why she has smashed him to the ground, today, he wasn't supposed to do so."

Rena laughed: "Perhaps Shii-chan is right, Gi-chan seemed a real chief, yesterday, even if Rena thinks he doesn't want to become so. He wanted to protect us, and his sister, too."

Alice shook her hand: "You should avoid to say it to him directly, he would become embarrassed in a couple of nanoseconds, and his homicidal instinct could suddenly awake... However, yes, I think he felt the need to do so, we all were in a real danger." The others observed her, while she was continuing: "You know, since we had started to go to school, we were used to behave in opposite ways, and we have never changed. When everything goes fine, Nii-chan tends to disappear, and each time I have to spur him, to make him talk with his schoolmates, the other people... I keep him far from a full solitude, and I show his real self to the outer world. I want the others to realize he's a pleasant guy, in the end."

She drank another sip of the coffee she had in front of her, and then she kept on: "Instead, when the situation starts becoming troublesome, when there is something really wrong... He takes the control of everything, and he helps me, and the others he cares about. I don't know how he can do that, I don't know which impulse gushes from his mind, but he always knows what to do in that moment, he feels at ease in those moments, it's strange but it's the truth. We are..." she smiled "We are completely different. I am a sunflower, which continuously aims at the Sun and grows up strong, he's a jessamine which appears shyly when the night is dark, able to survive even without light."

"Sunflower and jessamine..." repeated Satoko. Alice smiled again, looking at her.

"Do you like that metaphor? Grandma has imagined it, when we were little kids, she has always loved flowers, and she has read a lot of poems and lyrics... The sight of sunflower is a landmark for daily insects, the sweetness of the jessamine guides the nocturne ones, instead. Day and night, yes. We belong to two opposing worlds, in a way, we really don't seem brother and sister, and not only physically."

"Hey, you have a lot of resemblances, too!" exclaimed Shion "You both are quite good at school, and you are not evil boys. You care about your friends, even if your brother uses a freaky way to show that, I guess."

"I know it. After all in that metaphor I've talked about two flowers, not about two alien living beings. And we have something else in common, if we strongly decide to do a thing we can become extremely stubborn... But whatever, I think we are absolutely different, more that what brothers usually are. We have chosen opposite ways to face the Evil, and we both have accepted the other's one. More than love or affection, between us there is a strong respect... neither of us could do what the other has done, and so we appreciate each other. I don't remember a serious quarrel between us, in all these years."

"Rena likes this esteem of yours, but I don't agree about this, about the fact of putting on the same plane your ways of acting. You can't stay far from the others, not always, at least. Sometimes there is a moment when you have to interact with the external world, otherwise the obstacle in front of you will become unbearable. That's why Rena personally prefers how you have fought with us, instead of being far from all of us, and doing what your brother has done."

Alice nodded, but she answered: "I understand your point of view, and I'd like Nii-chan to have followed this suggestion... But he couldn't. He couldn't follow my same path, he _had to choose_ another one."

"What do you mean?"

"Do you remember what I've told you yesterday? I had talked about our great grandpa... and about the fact he had not been a good person. Yes..." Alice's look seemed to turn off "He was a monster."

Nobody replied, the environment around them had abruptly got dark and distressing, and the girl's following words sharpened that sensation. "He was a monster, yes. After World War II he allowed the cotton mill of our family to grow up more and more, and a lot of people esteemed him for his ability. But he has caused a lot of pain to most of our relatives. He was not a violent man, but he pretended to have an absolute authority on us, and he didn't accept any criticism. I was told about a day when he didn't allow our Uncle to go to the doctor, even if his son's measles didn't hint to disappear, and he forced him to stay at his work. He had claimed that his nephew shouldn't look for help for such a stupid illness, and he got to the point of prohibiting the usage of drugs for him. So, that same afternoon his little son had suddenly a complication, and he went into a coma. Despite having been some day in hospital, that illness had left a painful mark on him, he lost part of his sight, and even today he's nearly blind. But the most horrible thing was great Grandpa's comment on what has happened: _What an idiot, I should disinherit him for having humiliated me and my bloodline..._"

"And... what was your Uncle's reaction?"

"Of course he was furious, and he stopped talking to him for a while. But you know, he was working for his cotton mill, and living in a little village is always a problem, when you quarrel with one of the most important person of the community, you already know what this can mean..."

Shion swallowed, hearing her friend's words. "He had not to break relationship with him, somehow. He couldn't report to the police, he risked to be accused in turn, the one at the hospital was his son. Moreover, he would have lost his job, and his family would have been outcast, which was even worse. Yes, that man was having us in his pocket, and there are much more examples about him, involving Grandpa, Dad, Mom... But please don't remind me those. You know, great Grandma had died in childbirth, while Grandpa was coming into light. He was his first-born son, but losing his wife had been tragic, probably it was what had made his character so ferocious."

"And none of his relatives had found the courage to..."

"Grandpa has had two sons and a daughter, but, in the years his father had been alive, none of the males of the family was a man strong enough, they couldn't resist to his despotism. And Dad was probably too young, in that period. You know, in our hometown the chief of the family, the one used to be called _pater familias_ by the Latins, had a great power, but this habit was disappearing. Our great Grandpa tried to resume it, I'd say, but the result had been horrible."

"It hadn't been enjoyable, surely. But this is over, thank Goddess."

"Yes, he likely had realized that he couldn't go on so, too, and in the last years of his life he felt that his death was approaching, so he started being interested in occult. Magic, sorcery, strange experiments, and anything else about that kind of stuff. I remember all those stacks of books, when I was a little kid... They were heavy, and dusty, I didn't dare touching them. He had started to study even the past of Serco, our village."

Alice took a pause, when she went on: "Serco is not Hinamizawa. It's much smaller, and in the past there were even less peasants, no more than 100, 150 people. Something like Hinamizawa's Spirit would never have worked, such a small group couldn't frighten its enemies, even if united. To scare them, and the armies which sometimes ran into the village, they had to look for something else... In the 17th Century someone in the zone had written a lot of books about magic cast by Serco's inhabitants, and to give to it a sort of scientific foundation they had talked about an imaginary apparatus inside human body, like another circulatory system. Using sympathetic relationship and similar absurdities, they thought that inside every single man there was a spark able to give them the strength to face every menace and danger, using their enemies' power to multiply it and direct it against them. Namely, if someone attacked a person from Serco, there would not have been an answer by two of them, like what Hinamizawa's Spirit claims, but that single man would have gained the strength of two people, and he would have counterattacked. We could define it as another kind of Spirit, a more individualist one perhaps, but which would have brought devastating results once our whole village had fought all together..."

"It was something related to each person's mind, of course. It was a sort of magic, and to pay homage to this custom our past ancestors had dedicated themselves to the studying and to the reading of texts. It's an usage common even nowadays, in our family, generally we have always preferred mental activities to physical ones, and Nii-chan is the perfect example for this. You know, one of the things which have surprised me here in Hinamizawa was the fact that the local traditions talk about a descent from Demons, which implies a certain brute force and physical strength... While in our hometown we had never loved to fight with swords, and that kind of weapons. Inside our family, you will never find an old mystical sword, full of proud stories and tales, unlike in case of the Sonozakis, or of the Furudes. You looked to be based on the strength of your body, we instead were based on the one of our mind. It's an interesting parallelism. Personally I've learned something about using a foil, but actually I am rather an exception within the Serco family, and perhaps it's because of the fact we have never been good at fighting, if I am not a good fencer."

"However, those theories about our presumed ability to use magic were absurd, they were obviously false. Real history tells that they were used to hide themselves inside the many caves in the countryside, when some army arrived, as it's normal to do, they were too few to resist. But those fool swindlers looked alike they had forgotten it, and they wad written all those books... Moreover, that was the period of the Witch Hunt, but Italy wasn't that involved in it, fortunately, and probably that story sounded absurd even to people of that period, so there hadn't been any incidents, otherwise we could have not been born, maybe. But great Grandpa believed in it."

"I'm sorry to interrupt you" said Rena "But why are you talking about this story?"

"Yes, you're right, it must sound boring to you, let me explain... Our great-grandfather spent a lot of time reading those texts, maybe to find something who could grant him a longer life, but, of course, he didn't achieve anything. He went mad, alone and abandoned, and despair led him to death, when Nii-chan and I were four years old. But his influence lasted also in the following years."

"In the beginning, they asked an uncle of my mother to direct the cotton mill, he had just retired from his work, and he was the most suitable member of the family, for that job. And in the meanwhile Grandpa became the "chief" of the family. Of course, he was not a real chief. Nobody wanted a ruler like the one great Grandpa had been, their wounds were still bleeding, Moreover, their past ruler wanted his heir to go on following that road, and they didn't want to obey to an order of him anymore. But in that period Grandpa had to restore the connections with our relatives abroad, who were resolute not to have anything with us anymore, he had to face what had happened in the past, and he had to be a good guide without being a tyrant. It was hard. It was impossible, for him. He has never been a strong man, and each time he feared to become too cruel, even if that attitude meant not to take any decision at all, and to be useless in every situation. It would have been the end of our family, and he soon realized it. When we were 8, he threw in the towel, and he asked Dad to take his place."

"When he was told that, we were in Japan, in Tokyo. We have already told you about this period. We were serene, there, but that call had been a rough awakening. Dad is paradoxically even more clumsy than his father, he didn't understand the reason of our relatives' choice, and he didn't know what to do. Our house was full of anguish, but we knew he couldn't refuse, and we had to go back to our hometown. I wonder... I wonder if Flavia had decided to stay in Japan because of that. I wonder if she asked to live with the Keresana family because she wanted to escape from that nightmare. Nobody of us wanted her to suffer from that pain, and our parents let them go. Yes, this must have been the truth, and I don't blame them."

"Dad was not ready for that role, and he immediately showed it. I remember a day, when I entered his room unseen... I saw him crying, desperately, hugged by her wife. He has always been a quiet man, looking for a quiet life, and that stress was killing him. That look shocked me. I was furious, really. I have never been so angry as that day, neither in the years after. At once, I went to the graveyard of our village, looking for his grave."

The others immediately realized who _his _referred to, so they didn't ask for anything, and they waited for her to go on. They could see her eyes, trembling due to the facts she was remembering, and she was closing her fists, as to restrain herself. It was the first time they were seeing her so furious, and her voice was uselessly trying to hiding her state of mind: "I was carrying a stick, that day. When I arrived in front of his grave, I started to hit it, violently. I wanted to destroy it. He had swept away all the happiness in our family, I couldn't forgive him, I couldn't. I hit, and I hit, and I hit, and I hit, and I hit... without being stopped by anyone, I was alone, I thought to be alone... But I was too young, and weak. The slab, the tombstone on it was still complete, with no cracks. I felt so frustrated in that moment, I was thinking to be useless, to be someone meaningless. But in that moment I looked at the top of the stone. On it, there was a little statue. A figure of an angel."

"_At least this... At least this... _This is what I had thought. He couldn't pretend to be an angel, I couldn't accept it, I would have forbidden him to claim so. I collected all my strength, and I stroke a last hit. The statue flew away, in pieces. I looked at it, wordless, for so many minutes... And then I sat on the slab, crying. I went to home very late in the evening, that day."

Alice suddenly stopped looking angry, and her glance became melancholy: "The following evening, someone asked for a council, in our living room. Everybody had found a piece of paper reporting it, but their author's name was not present on any of them. We were so curious, we couldn't think about a joke. And when everyone was there, I noticed the door of the room opening, and Nii-chan came in. He looked so resolute, in that moment, that everybody looked at him, and he didn't make them wait. He made a very short speech, he has never been good at it, but it had been extremely meaningful. He said that, after seeing what was happening to the others, he would have taken the lead of the family immediately, starting from the end of that meeting, and anyone who didn't agree with him had to reply at once, or he wouldn't have another chance."

"I'm sure, he had seen me at the graveyard, the previous day, I thought to be alone, but a guardian angel was observing me. A real one, not one like that small statue. He had somewhat understood my feelings, and the feelings the others had, and he wanted to take all of them upon himself. I remember, when he finished speaking, Grandpa approached him, and he observed him. He was uneasy, worried about that choice of him... but he had been charmed by his attitude, too. I wasn't sure who was the adult between the two of them, in that moment. And the others too, they didn't say a thing. They limited themselves to eye each other, trying to realize if it was the best solution. And they didn't find a more suitable one. After all, this could arrange everything. Finally, Grandpa knelt next to him, he caressed his head and he just said, smiling _Don't worry, we'll all assist you._"

"This story is so similar to what had happened yesterday..." Rena commented "But was it the best choice? He was so young..."

"I don't know" Alice replied "As I've just said, everyone in our family is free to do what he pleases, unlike what happened some years ago, and Nii-chan can give only some advise. Still, after that evening, the aura of scare and uneasiness around us had been disappearing, slowly. You know, the first thing he made was reducing the size of the cotton mill, bringing it back to the one it had before our great-grandfather's arrival, and firing the excess of workers. He didn't want a huge company, and even if it had been a high-priced decision they let him do it. Therefore, in the following summer they drove him to Belgium, Switzerland and France, to resume the bonds with the other minor branches of the family. It took a few time to do that, he had to go there also in the following years, but somewhat he was successful. Everyone was relieved, in the end, they had found someone resolute to be a landmark for all of them... Someone ready to carry their fears, their uncertainties... and their sins, without falling. He had decided to do what he could to save his family, and me too. He has allowed me not to be overwhelmed by the pain, and the anger I was feeling in those days."

She smiled, raising her eyes and looking strangely a bit tired: "That's why everyone has an enormous respect towards him, at home. He has to spends most of the evenings answering at the phone, lots of our relatives want always to know how is he, what's happening here... No, I'm exaggerating, now, but they phone very often, asking also for his opinion about the most various subjects. Furthermore, our whole family, and I too... We'd all like him to find a girl to spend his whole life with. The role he has taken is not a pleasant one, and he has chosen it willingly, he'd do it again even now. Still, he needs as much support as possible, and having a wife would be marvelous for him, they both would be happy together, I'm sure of this. Yes, I'd like him to live happily, too, as much as I has been allowed to be. He has been my guardian angel, now I want to be the same for him. I'm aware that inside his soul there is all the pain, and the repressed rage of our whole family... and I don't want this to have an influence on his life. I don't want to leave him alone, even now, that's why I need your help."

Alice stopped speaking. She had lowered her look, again, and her eyes were glistening. But fortunately, a hand touched hers. Rena was looking at her, smiling, and that face was everything her friend needed to know, they hadn't to add a word.

...

Some minute later, Giancarlo had arrived. After greeting the others, he reminded Alice and Rena that it was already late, and the three of them went away, pointing at the police station. So, Satoko, Satoshi and Shion could go on chatting alone.

"Do you think she's going to inform him about what she has told us?" asked the green-haired girl.

"Likely." answered Satoko "He's not a villain like a boy I know quite well, he would notice it soon anyway."

"I agree with you." added Satoshi. "Yes... I see..." the boy was thoughtful, and the other girls realized it soon. They asked him what the matter was.

"No, nothing... I was thinking about Giancarlo-san, and Keiichi-san... And I was envious."

"Envious?" Shion couldn't believe to what his boyfriend was saying.

Satoshi nodded, then he explained: "Yesterday, I have seen them... Both of them are strong, yes, they are strong. They have fought guided by their nature, they have won, I can't deny it. What I have done, instead? What can I do for them, now?" he smiled, then he went on: "You know, when I've joined you, some month ago, I was glad to be with Satoko again, and with you, your sister, and all the new people I hadn't met yet... But I want to do something to repay you for your kindness towards me, and towards Satoko. I'd like to show my gratitude for everything you have done for us, because you have saved our lives, and I can't deny either this. But the fact is that yesterday I suddenly have realized that... that I am actually useless."

Shion looked at the boy, pensive. It was not a very positive way to describe his current situation, but he had got a point. Before reaching the L5 of the Hinamizawa Syndrome, he had been an irreplaceable support for Satoko, he had saved her from madness. But now Teppei and his wife were not there, and she wasn't menaced by anyone anymore. What might he do, now? He was not a genius, the year he had spent far from school had forced him not to go to university, he couldn't recover that enormous handicap. His physical was not outstanding, Keiichi was stronger than him, even if he was younger, and, after all, Irie had suggested him to join his baseball team to help him to develop some muscular tonicity. Nor his character was strong, his sister was becoming much more resolved than him, even thanks to her recent experiences. He was a muddler, a clumsy person, even a color blind one. He could only bear with his fears, and protect Satoko and Shion, in the past. But now, what was his role?

Shion thought about it for a while, until being interrupted by Satoko's glance, who was likely reflecting about the same matter. She loved her brother, for sure, but this didn't forbid her to be objective and critical, as her usual. But finally, the green-haired girl looked at his boyfriend, smiling. There was something she could say, to relieve his sister and him. Remembering a short speech of encouragement Keiichi had told her some time before, while she was still waiting for her boyfriend's return, she changed some word of it, and she spoke: "Listen, Satoshi-kun... I could say we all need you, as sons need parents, sisters need brothers, and wives need husbands, but you already know it, probably. What you should be told, instead, is that nobody of us can know what our role will be in the future, I can't, you can't, Kei-chan can't... Something unexpected always happens, and it usually decides what we have to do. Simply, we must be ready for that. Just wait, Satoshi-kun, your moment will arrive, and then we'll be proud to be your friends."

* * *

**Author's note: ****I hope you've enjoyed this chapter, where I've described some point of view, especially Alice's one. After all, she wanted Rena to become her brother's girlfriend, not only because she was "free", at the moment, but also because she knows he needs a strong partner, and she has realized Rena's soul is what she's looking for (in Meakashi-hen's visual novel, Shion herself had recognized Rena's "demon" was stronger than hers, I'm not inventing anything).**

**Don't forget to leave a short review, if you want.**


	24. Dreaming a normal life

_**24 – Dreaming a normal life**_

_Okinomiya, 19th December 1983_

"So... She has told you about that story."

Rena nodded. Giancarlo and she were into Flavia's car, alone, while reaching Okinomiya's police station. That was why Alice wanted to wait for him, at the Keresanas' cafe, they might have used the other officers' car, but the Italian girl wanted the two of them to stay alone, to talk about the subject, and know better each other. She would have followed them with the other car, they would have been anyway safe.

Rena had decided to be sincere, and to make him aware of what they had been told. When she finished, the boy said nothing for a while, looking only at the road. The inside of the car became very noiseless, uneasily quiet. But the girl preferred not to speak to break the silence, Giancarlo was thinking about an answer, his glance was confirming it to her. And another thing had drawn her attention, in the meanwhile. A leaf had suddenly stopped his flight on the windscreen of the car, getting stuck under one of the wipers. It had certainly fallen from a tree months before, during autumn, but somehow it had wandered during all that period, avoiding the dustmen and the street cleaning operators. Rena observed it. _Where is it from? How much is it going to survive, most of all? _That leaf was completely dry and curled up, it was impossible to say the species of the tree it had fallen from. It was a leaf, and nothing else, an absolutely ordinary leaf, not far from ending its existence. If someone had simply pound it by random, or taken it into his hands, it would have been easily torn to pieces. Maybe even a strong wind would have been too much for it. _Poor little one... _Instinctively, Rena felt the need to protect it. She wanted to bring it home, like Kenta-kun's statue, and all the other things she had there. Being a broken object, or even a useless one... these details weren't important for her. It would have suited the peaceful environment she had created at her home, and that was enough. She wanted it to be safe, as well as she desired it for herself. So, the girl started to wind down the window next to her, and she started to project her arm. Lifebelts wouldn't have been a problem, it was so next to her... But before her hand could touch it, the leaf freed itself from the wiper, and it flew away, behind them, towards a new flight, probably its last one. Rena followed its movement with her eyes until she couldn't see it anymore, disappointed, and in the end she wished it good luck, in her mind.

The boy next to her didn't speak, in that moment. He limited himself to observe the scene, while keeping an eye on the road. But finally, when it had ended, he started to open his mouth.

"Rena, you know... I don't blame her, for having said that. Yesterday has been a stressful day, and what had happened had to be explained. She wanted to make you understand I behaved so for a reason, and I'm aware of her good intention. Still, I don't like a lot to talk about it, it's not pleasant for me, and it's not something you can be proud of."

Rena turned to him, surprised: "Why aren't you proud of it? You have..."

The other one interrupted her: "You are talking about the last part of her tale, am I right? I see... I was referring to the beginning of it, instead. I'm... I'm used to look first for the worst part of everything, I should change this bad habit."

Rena didn't reply immediately. Then she asked: "But you _are _proud of what you've done, aren't you?"

Another pause, before he answered: "I... I had done what I thought it was the best thing. Claiming to be proud would mean boasting of it, and..." he slightly smiled "And that doesn't belong to my nature." It was a strange and twisted way to say he was happy to have done so, but it was so, and Rena smiled in turn, satisfied.

Then he went on: "Well, we have been very unlucky, in the end... Great Grandma had died in the beginning of 1916, his husband had gone to fight just some month before. Who knows, if she had been still alive, when he had come back... He wasn't aware of her death until then, World War I had been a harsh period, and they feared to destroy his soul, if they had written about those news to him during the conflict, perhaps they were afraid that he could start to search for his death, in that case. Well, now I can say that had been the wrong choice. He was desperate, after he had been informed of it. And shortly after he fell ill, struck by the Spanish."

"The Spanish?" asked Rena, and Giancarlo nodded.

"Yes... it had been a giant flu pandemic, occurred right after the end of the War. They say it has killed more people than the War itself, millions and millions of victims. Probably the seniors still remember it, here. And our great-grandfather had been about to add his name to that list, but he was able to heal, on the contrary of his parents." He took a pause, before adding: "Of course, I was not there in that period and I can't be sure of it, but being alone, with his only child, must have been a terrible experience, and to save what had left of the family he likely had started developing that strict and authoritarian temper."

"Are you trying... to justify him, Gi-chan?"

The Italian boy looked at Rena for a second, without even considering the road in front of him. Then he replied: "No, I am not. I can't. There must have been causes that have pushed him to that attitude, but he can't be forgiven just because of that. He died when Alice and I were very little kids, but we were grown enough to taste the atmosphere we were all breathing, at home. Everyone." he swallowed "Everyone must always keep in mind what is wrong, and having had a sad past doesn't allow you to do what you please, and to make the others suffer like you had. No, even worse, I am sure that Dad, Mom, and all the others... They have suffered _much more_ than what he has."

Giancarlo was breathing a bit gaspingly, now. A shroud of anger had appeared in his eyes, and he was holding tightly the wheel, as to chase those thoughts away. Then, he slowly calmed down, and he apologized with Rena: "I'm sorry, I shouldn't behave so. I shouldn't hate dead people, these feelings can only poison me... Yes, that must be why I can't bear with aggressive people, they remind me about the past. And so I make his same mistake."

Rena smiled again, to relieve him: "Oh, I remember your first day of school here, you pretended to be angry towards Mii-chan... but you didn't look a bad man in that moment, you seemed more like an adorable curmudgeon, even in that situation... You shouldn't blame yourself, fearing to be the bad person you are not."

"Oh, well..." Giancarlo blushed, while he was stopping the car, because of a red traffic light. "Mii-chan is not an aggressive girl, in the end. She has a lot of good and bad qualities, but she's not a mean girl, on the contrary, she's a kind and friendly woman, really."

"Yes" Rena replied, leaning his hand on the boy's one, which was now on the gear-shift "Mii-chan is a wonderful person, and you are too. Make Rena happy, and never forget it, please."

Giancarlo didn't know what to answer, embarrassed, but that compliment had visibly pleased him.

…

Some minute later, they arrived at the station, as planned. They got out of their cars, and they went to the upper floor of the building, where Flavia was waiting for them. And she was not alone.

"Keiichi-kun, Rena is so happy to see you! But why are you here, why?"

"Oh, let's call it _interest towards friends_... Now that the JOST is not our most compelling obstacle, we can focus on you, now. Maebara Keiichi never forgets his friends!" Curiously, that was the problem, but he hadn't realized it yet, or at least he didn't look so.

"But... are you alone, here? Namely, Mii-chan, Rika-chan..."

"Oh, well..." Keiichi blushed "They are still at Clinic, as far as I know. They have told me Mion had to have some exam, and she had to undress herself, so a young man would have been out of place, there, and they have sent me away. So, I've asked Dad for a lift, tonight he would have come anyway to Okinomiya... and so here I am."

"Ah..." Alice went on asking "And so? What had Irie-sensei to tell you? He had been the one convening you there, initially, and it sounded so important..."

"Well, after all it was nothing special, you can easily imagine it. We..."

"Cough, cough" Flavia stopped him, and to reinforce the concept she powerfully hit him on his head with her open hand, moving it as a blade, as if she was dividing a mature watermelon into two halves. "Well, we are already late, so let's go to my office, and give an ice bag to this guy, who wouldn't stop caressing his own head and complaining, otherwise..."

Rena, Alice and the officers laughed, while Giancarlo looked at his unlucky friend, pitying him for his fate. Then, they followed Flavia, who sat on her chair, and opened a drawer, noisily ransaking among the various certificates in order to search for something. Then she opened another one, and afterwards a third one. She quickly became a bit nervous, she couldn't find what she was searching for, and she started looking around, to recall where she had put it. That scene was not unexpected, the whole office was a real mess, full of documents everywhere, and the spots of coffee on the desk couldn't be counted. Finally, she was the perfect example of the female emancipation: strong and willing, but as housewife she was a disaster. Fortunately she had married a man who was just the opposite of her, and so his husband was the one who usually took care of their house.

"I... I was sure to have seen it somewhere..." Flavia scratched nervously her head, and she started fearing that she would have been forced to say it by voice. But she changed her mind when she noticed Rena. She was smiling, and holding a short yellow dossier, on which they had written the date of that day.

"It was under one of the legs of your desk... Rena thinks it was what you were looking for, is she right, is she?"

"Yes, here it is! Thank you Rena-chan, you would be a valuable helper, surely more valuable than the two guys behind you."

"Hey!" the two young officers replied "We have escorted her the whole day, and now is this your reward?"

"Ah, sure, I was forgetting it. Well, I'm offering a coffee to return your favor."

"I want a strong one, keep at least this in mind." exclaimed one of them, before smiling amused. It was not a serious quarrel, that was Flavia's way to create a friendly work environment, and the others appreciated it. However, she took the dossier from Rena's hands, and she opened it. She looked for four sheets of paper, and then she showed it to the others, putting them on her desk. Three of them had been placed side by side, the fourth one was instead separated.

"These are fingerprints, I'd say" observed Keiichi "So you have found them even on Rena's coat, am I right?"

"Yes. It's winter, and I feared the culprit might have worn gloves, but we've been lucky. As you can see, we have made some comparison, with all the people involved in the previous murders. And we've discovered something very interesting. This sheet" she took the lone one, showing it to the others "has a print of what we have found on Rena's jacket, yesterday. The others" she pointed at the three sheets still on the desk "are the victims' fingerprints, which we have collected when they had been killed. Do you notice anything?"

The group observed them, trying to find out the answer. Rena, the one sat on the other chair of the office and therefore the nearest to the desk, commented: "It really seems the test Irie-sensei asks Satoko-chan to do every month: he always takes some drawing, and Satoko-chan says what she thinks they are. Last week I've attended her down at the Clinic and they have shown me..."

"Is it really so?" asked Keiichi, who was analyzing them as well. And suddenly he opened his eyes wide. "Hey, the fingerprints on the sheet you're holding... and these..." he took one of the documents on the desk, and he read the name of their owner "Seohara Koji-san... Yes, they are the same drawings!"

"That would have been too easy, Maebara-kun..." replied Flavia, shaking her hand "And a dead man can kill no one, don't you think? Look more deeply, please."

Keiichi observed the two sheets he was holding, now. And after some second he discovered the truth. He laid them on the desk again, and he explained. "They are not the same, you were right. But there is some strong resemblance between them."

"That's right. Luckily these documents were in the dossier like the ones involving the actual suspicions, so we have checked them too. You know, you don't imagine a corpse can become a guilty, so you never consider them, usually..."

"Being a bit messy carries some advantage, indeed." exclaimed Rena, smiling "But what does this mean?"

"Oh, well... We can't be sure of it, however we can't fly over this similarity. Finally, everyone carries unique fingerprints, we wouldn't use them otherwise. But their basic structure is a hereditary factor. Arches, loops, whorls... The shapes present, and the basic way they are placed are predetermined, and only the so-called minutiae distinguish each fingerprint. Namely, a mother and a son have not the same traces, but they can have similar ones."

"So are you saying that the culprit is one of Seohara-san's relatives?"

Flavia eyed him, and then she nodded.

"This is the first thing I thought too. It's true that this resemblance was very meaningful, but we couldn't consider this as an evidence. It's a clue, but even people who have never met each other before can have similar traces, it's just like having the same hair, or eyes. So I had to look for something else, to get the confirm this was the right path to follow."

"Hadn't you taken the fingerprints of his relatives, before? You could have found it immediately."

"No, we didn't have any suspicion about them. They all had a cast-iron alibi for the first murder, which had been Seohara Koji-san's one exactly, and also in the other cases there was nothing strange about them, no particular clues. They looked to have no possible motive, in the end. And contacting Ibaraki's police, to ask them to take now their fingerprints, basing uniquely on a blurry theory like this... You can understand yourself they would have never given heed to me."

Flavia sighed, but instantly she set back to her speech with a will "Yet, do you want to know the most interesting detail? Rena-chan's father told me Seohara-san had been painfully hit in the zone just above his right eye, when she had been attacked in Ibaraki, and that he had suffered from some serious damage. Well, I wasn't aware of it, nobody had told me about it and they hadn't written about it on his file, so I checked his old medical records, and I found there is no trace of it. No special glasses, no scars, no surgery, nothing."

Rena rebutted: "But, when Rena had been sent those cuttings, with that intimidating message... There was a photo of him in one of the articles, and he was wearing glasses..."

"You're right, but they were common ones, used to fight against a normal myopia due to natural causes. His lack of sight had not been originated by an accident."

"So Rena was wrong..." she concluded, lowering her eyes. But Flavia immediately noticed her change of mood: "I know how you're feeling, Rena-chan. It's all fine, give me only some second, and everything will be clear. Finally, that story helped me to discover a very important thing."

The girl looked at her, asking her to go on by a glance: "This is the point: Seohara Koji-kun looked fine, reading his medical folders, but inside his family there was something unusual... I checked their other records, and I've found that his younger brother had suffered from a bad illness, a severe visual disturbance occurred some time ago."

"How... how is it possible? Rena doesn't understand."

"Rena-chan, I am sure that in that period you were overstrained, and you weren't interested in what they had done after they had assaulted you. You didn't want either to know those boys' names. But Oishi-san knew the detail of that wounding, too, so you hadn't invented it for sure. It's not so difficult to realize what had happened, then."

"His brother... had told their parents he was his fault..."

"Exactly, I agree with you. The parents of all of them were informed about what they had done, but maybe they didn't know the whole truth. Both of the Seohara brothers belonged to the same company of boys, and it hadn't been hard for him to lie. Maybe he had even told that his brother had fought against him, to protect Rena-chan, who knows. It had been easy, the others had no reason to contradict him, there had not been any denounce, nobody wanted to investigate deeply... So he was able to do it, with no effort. I suppose he wanted to protect his younger brother, since he was a pretty good student and he didn't want him to be expelled by that school. Personally I can't imagine a different reason for it, however... Remorse? Something he wanted to hide? I can't exclude it, we will never know it, too much time have passed since then, and now he can't tell us anymore. Even if I have to say he had not been able to save him wholly... his brother has drastically changed his attitude, after that accident."

Flavia stopped herself, to look at Rena's reaction. She was feeling uneasily, worried about the continuation of her tale. The officer, then, laid a hand on her head, to encourage her: "You don't have to feel guilty for this, it was their fault, and only theirs. Don't you think so, too?"

"What had happened to him?" was Rena's answer. Flavia sighed, and she explained: "Probably that incident, and the consequent wound, had damaged not only his eye, but also his brain... After a period he had been hospitalized, he started to change his behavior, becoming very rude and violent. He even stopped attending school, there were full weeks when he simply couldn't hold a book into his hands, you can imagine his marks. His parents didn't know how to help him, and neither his brother did. His are... how can I explain it... sudden changes of mood. At a moment is quiet and normal, and at the following one he starts attacking someone. Maybe it's schizophrenia, I don't know it precisely, but a psychologist has been trying to cure him for some month, as far as I know. And it had not been easy to discover it, his parents didn't want to talk about it. It must have been mixture of pride and shame, I think, it's understandable after all, that must have been painful."

"So you're thinking he's the culprit... Weren't you suspecting about him, before?"

"As I've told you before, he had an alibi. And since we are talking about someone with some mental disorder, we can't be sure he has killed someone until now. Maybe those murders has given him the "strength" to act, and to menace you. There were a lot of people suitable to be the real killer, more than him... The other killed boys themselves had something suspicious. Nagisa-san's family had already faced bloody events, the boy's sister had died not a long time ago, due to a track which had run over her; it's not a pleasant story, especially for their parents. As for Shikoku-san, he had some contact with a group of delinquents, I was told, and they are still looking in that direction, at the moment. We are talking about something big, a very serious affair, but that's not important, now, it's nothing related to your case."

"I see..." said Keiichi, leaning a hand on Rena's shoulder, just like what Flavia had just done earlier "So? Where is he, now? You've arrested him, I suppose."

"Well... I fear you're wrong. Since last Saturday he has left home, and his parents don't know where he's gone."

"Oh, my... that's a real problem!"

"Don't blame me for that!" Flavia complained "I can't direct the inquiry in Ibaraki from here, it's impossible! I should go there and teach those awkward officers about how to be decent policemen... Oh, well, they'll surely find him, if he's in Ibaraki, and if he's still in our district we'll be the ones who catch him. He's alone, without money, he can't go on hiding himself for a long time."

"It will be enough not to leave Rena-chan alone, and she won't risk anything." added Alice, to raise her friend's mood "However, let's make this dialogue useful. If he has been the one who had pushed her, yesterday, how could he know she was there? He didn't follow us, we have driven her at Okinomiya, and nobody was behind us, I'm sure of it"

"Easy" answered Keiichi "We had publicized greatly the protest march, and we had claimed that all Hinamizawa was going to be present. And I know also why he knew the third office was going to burst, and why he had pushed her there... After all, there had been already two explosions, and it was predictable. You have told he was a brilliant guy, so he must have realized it; however, even if he hadn't yet, Satoko had shouted what was going to happen, so he couldn't be unaware of it."

"Namely" observed Flavia "He's someone who doesn't go on spying Rena-chan, he's not a real stalker. A nearly normal person, who sometimes goes mad with no apparent reason, and attacks. It suits his supposed schizophrenia, I guess. But in this case, once he had gone back to normality, where might he have headed for?"

"We are talking about a sort of new Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde, I suppose that when he had recovered his self-control he wasn't able to remember what he had done before... So I don't think he could realize to be in Okinomiya, in the beginning. He likely has asked someone for it, to understand where was he, but then? He hasn't phoned to his parents, they would know where is he. Maybe has he some friend in Okinomiya?"

"Some bad friend, if it's so, they shouldn't welcome him in their house, without asking what has happened. Well, we have to find him, we'll make his disappearance public, it will be harder for him to hide himself. If he's living in someone's house, the ones who are giving hospitality to him will know the truth, and maybe they'll help us."

"OK, then..."

"Rena is sorry to disturb you so much." the girl's words interrupted Flavia and Keiichi's dialogue. She was keeping her head low, without daring to look at her friends. It was not only Seohara who was following her. It was also her past. The past which she wanted to avoid, to cancel from her life, that was why she had changed her name. And now, that past was chasing after her, to demonstrate to her that it had existed, and that she couldn't deny it. Couldn't she spend a normal life, then? Couldn't Seohara spend a normal life, either? Why had he to do that, instead of staying with his family...

Keiichi, hearing her, answered immediately. He didn't want her to sink into desperation. "Rena, what do you want we to do to make you happy?"

Rena raised her head, surprised by that proposal: "I... Rena wouldn't know what to say..."

"You're right. There is no good answer to this question. The truth is that we always make choices, and these often make someone unhappy. But pretending that someone is sad because of us is like pretending to be a God... like Oyashiro-sama. No, like one even more powerful, neither Oyashiro could make his villagers happy in the past, and I am sure he was sorry for this."

Rena nodded, and her friend continued: "No human being can have such a power, luckily, it would only bring him to craziness and desperation. If there's something we can do to make a person happy, we'd better do it, of course, and I understand the cases where the other claims he's fine and he can do it alone, but you know he does want to be helped... But all this sense of responsibility can't compel the others to do what they don't like to do. You can suggest, give advice to the neighbor... but the last choice belongs to him, and he only has to blame himself, if that is a wrong one. We can't force everyone to do something, they would never be happy even if it's the right path to follow."

Rena was thinking about what he was saying, so he went on: "I hope it's understandable enough... When someone is unhappy, it's also because of his own actions, the others have a lesser role in it. And blaming the others never solves your problem. So, if Seohara-san thinks you have destroyed his existence, he's only a stupid paranoic who has understood nothing about life, and he has not the right to ruin yours too. Don't you agree with me, Rena? This story is going to end very soon, you've listened to us, and we are all here, by you."

The girl next to him smiled, relieved, and Alice clapped: "Wonderful speech, Kei-chan. Your words would be able to awake the deads, if necessary."

"Oh, nothing special, he-he-he. Flavia had already explained there is nothing to worry about, I've only told the truth, without inventing anything, and I have worked out her concept with other words."

"Still this is a great gift, be proud of it. You're so different from Nii-chan..."

Giancarlo, who was looking at the whole scene in a corner without participating, answered annoyed: "Hey, you should be enough to make her happy, if I have to use your own words, Rena-chan is nearly surrounded by all of you... Why have you always to involve me?"

"Because creating a friendly environment requires the presence of everyone, and you're not allowed to stay far from us." Alice grabbed his left hand, and she dragged him towards the others. "Good, now everything is fine."

"No, it's not. Kei-chan has just said you have not to give orders, and you do the opposite after a few seconds..."

"Because you are an exception, the exception which proves the rule."

"Oh, Rena thinks he belongs to the group of the people who won't admit to please the others' friendship." she exclaimed, laughing "Gi-chan is really a boy out of ordinary, he is."

Giancarlo looked at her embarrassed, as red as a beetroot, while Alice burst into laughter "Yes, that's the best description you can give about him!" She was very happy of that comment, it looked a wonderful sign of Rena's interest in him. "Well, if necessary, you might go and live in Rena-chan's house, to protect her just like what Kei-chan has done some day ago..."

"N-n-no, thanks" he answered, in difficulty "I don't want to make the same poor figure."

The others laughed, amused, besides Keiichi, who had lost the thread of the discussion, and he didn't understand what they were referring to.


	25. Your best enemy

_**25 – Your best enemy**_

_Hinamizawa, 23rd December 1983_

"It's a real pity we can't attend Christmas Mass. Grandma won't appreciate it."

The two young Sercos were in front of a big building, whose first aim was to inspire respect towards who it represented. But, in spite of what they were talking about, it was not a Church, but a Manor. The Sonozakis' one to be exact.

"The nearest Church from here is in Nagoya" Alice answered to his brother's note "We couldn't reach it on time neither if we leave right now. And the last days' snow would be a further terrible obstacle, and it would slow us down, don't you think? Moreover, going there while leaving the others in this moment of need is not a Christian act, I guess."

"You're forgetting St. Lucia's Academy, Nee-chan, it's not that far from here. Shii-chan has told us about it... and wasn't there some nun, there? There will be a place where they are used to pray, too."

"It would be not a good idea. Shii-chan doesn't have good memories about that place, she had called it _factory for manufacturing ladies_. She didn't like that place, she said they didn't seem people you can trust."

"You can't be always influenced by what the others say, now. I wouldn't be surprised if she was the one who had got in trouble with them, she's so instinctive sometimes... If Shii-chan thinks it's a good idea to throw yourself from the top of a skyscraper, would you do it?"

"What kind of answer is it, Nii-chan? I wanted to say, it's not a place I can feel at ease. You know, some time ago someone had been even murdered, then, and they had sanded everything, they never had discovered the name of the guilty. Shii-chan was there when it had happened, and if you don't trust her you can always look for info on some old newspaper."

"I wonder if I can find also an article about her escape from it... I can't deny she hasn't been short on bravery, her punishment wouldn't have been a trifle... But it would be funny if they were still looking for her, after all this time..."

"I don't think it would be possible, it's much more plausible they had left her go after a very quick research. They couldn't avoid anymore the slight provoked by it, a lot of people were told it, and moreover the Sonozaki family had given up paying her fees, so..."

"She looks to like to cause problems, we could even say... I don't understand why she loves a boy so monotone."

"Mysteries of life" Alice laughed "Why don't you ask them for it, if you're so curious?"

Giancarlo preferred to close the discussion, fearing to lose that genre of fight: "Whatever. I agree that going inside a Church and singing happily is not that respectful, towards our friends. Let's enter the Manor and offer this sacrifice, hoping that God – and Grandma too – forgives us."

Alice laughed, and therefore they entered the room where they were about to attend the meeting they had been invited to. Everyone was already there, so they immediately sat. Rena was there too, she had reached the Manor with Rika and the usual two officers, and fortunately she seemed in a good mood, in spite of the disappointing results of the inquiry about her supposed stalker, who hadn't been found yet. Finally, she was fine, feeling herself protected. So, Mion was free to talk and illustrate the main purpose of their meeting, without wasting any time.

"Let's make things simple" she explained "The JOST has officially disappeared."

That short declaration made the others curious. Mion was not smiling, on the contrary she looked very serious. Wasn't this good news, then? And on the other hand, they hadn't been the ones who defeated it, so what had happened? This was what they were thinking, before the pony-tailed girl went on: "At least, this is what the prefect told me. On 21st December, two days ago namely, the society named_ Japanese Offices for the Services on the Territory_ has officially ceased its activity, and it has been disbanded. All their assets have been sold or transferred to other companies. The police is still trying to go back to their founders, but I don't think they will be successful, you know how this things work."

"So we can conlude that the JOST's only aim was to get their dirty hands on Hinamizawa, as a matter of fact." exclaimed Keiichi "They had created it no more than six months ago, and now it doesn't exist any more already. We were in danger, and maybe we are not safe yet... What about Nabiha-san? They must have queried him for sure."

"Yes. They had to wait for him to recover, after what _someone _had done to him." she looked at Giancarlo, annoyed. "And then they have asked him for everything he knew. Which was not satisfying, unluckily." She touched a document present on the table among them, to draw the others' attention on it. "This is some copy of his deposition, you can read what he had declared."

Satoko looked at those sheets, curious: "But shouldn't be this a secret file? Why is it here?"

"It's nothing serious, Satoko-chan, we could pass over the law in this case, I wanted to be sure, to avoid unpleasant surprises. However, let's focus on the important things, read this."

Each member of the club took a copy of the text, and did what Mion had suggested. On it, Nabiha had explained that he had been contacted by a man, who had offered him the chance to regain the honour his ancestors had in past. His family, in fact, was in decline, because his father had lost a great amount of money, and their influence in Okinomiya had nearly disappeared, to the Sonozakis' benefit. He didn't accept that, but he had decided to hide these feelings of his, claiming to be still a friend of the Kimiyoshi family. Probably the man who had contacted him was aware of that situation, he knew that under those good manners there was a never calmed hatred, and he had tempted him, successfully. He offered him money, and the fame he had lost, he would have been helped to become the most important man in Okinomiya, and that was what Nabiha was looking for.

"So this was his motive" commented Rena "I think that money was the lesser prize, for him. He was trying to be important again, to feel himself realized."

"Still, this doesn't explain how he was so stupid to trust such a man, likely never met before, who was promising the earth in exchange for an incredibly risky operation."

Rika looked at Shion, who had told those last words, and she grinned, sadly. _No, it's not strange at all, it's enough to be desperate, and you will start to believe in each unreal hope you are given... I know it very well, Takano's scrapbooks had caused to us so many disasters and tragedies, in the past... Yes, I don't think that Nabiha was very different from each of us, in the end. He has fallen because of his fears, but unlike us he won't have another chance to learn from his mistakes. I'm sorry for him, really. He has been much more unlucky than us. We can't leave him alone, I don't want to, even if he has been our enemy._

In the meanwhile, Alice was going on reading: "So they have allowed him to sign all those contracts, they would have used a transactional account, which Nabiha-san couldn't take cash from, for obvious reasons since he could always turn out to be nothing but a thief and withdraw all their money for other purposes... And afterwards... only useless details, I guess. So he didn't knew either the name of that man. What a pity. But why did you want us to read this, Mii-chan?"

"Because I wanted to make sure you know what I know" she answered, coldly. "Then, I can ask you: what's your final opinion about this story? And most of all, what have we to expect, now?"

"Here they have written that the man who had contacted Nabiha was aware of his state of mind, so he shouldn't be a foreigner. We should look inside the population of Okinomiya."

"Or the one of a near city, but basically I agree with you." That condition included Hinamizawa too, but Keiichi preferred not to say it explicitly. "And we should look for a rich citizen... who could avail of the necessary money to..."

"I thought about it too" answered Mion, without looking at him "And it's not possible. The Sonozaki family is by far the richest of the zone, and nobody else can have that amount of means, necessary for such a big undertaking. We can't exclude however that an external society has somewhat financed the one or the ones we are looking for, as well as they did towards Nabiha-san, to allow the JOST to have been founded. But this means that whoever can have done this."

"Here there's not a description of the man..." noticed Shion, reading again the text "How is it possible? Hasn't he seen him? Or... have they always talked by phone?"

"You're right... and it seems that he has called from a public phone in Okinomiya, we can't retrace him, for now. No, we have to search elsewhere."

"For example, we must find the final motive who has brought them to do this..." Alice commented "Let's think about an hypothesis..."

"Are you thinking about the Dam, Ali-chan?"

"Heh? Well, no, to tell the truth, it wouldn't have been the best strategy, then. In order to build it, they had to buy three or four more villages in addition to Hinamizawa, as Kimiyoshi-san had explained to me last Sunday. If it had been the case, they would have bought them first, and then they would have faced us. They would have left only scorched earth around us, to make sure we would have been alone. Flavia, Nii-chan and I had discussed about this chance at home, and we finally agreed about this thesis."

"But" observed Shion "If they had bought the other villages before attacking us, they would have spent a real fortune, and even before starting their plan. They couldn't ignore the risk of losing this battle, as they fortunately did as a matter of fact, and in this case they would have lost tons of money without getting much done."

"Ir wouldn't have happened so, it would have been enough to add another note to the contracts, where you claim you are going to pay them for everything only after some month. So, if you had to run away because of a fail, you could do it without losing a cent. No, anyway I really can't see it as a Dam War II."

"Ok, I can understand your reasons." Mion roughly interrupted her "Then, have you other ideas?"

"Well..." Rika said shyly "There is... the Syndrome."

Nobody answered. Using the disease to get rich? It was an abomination, but they knew someone had already tried to do it, ignoring the pain it would have caused, so they couldn't leave it out. However, Satoko said: "But it would have been strange. I understand that, if so, they would have looked only for Hinamizawa, as they did, and not for the whole valley... But they would have been interested in its villagers, not in the village itself. Their plan wouldn't have been suitable to their aim. It would have been much easier to kidnap someone, and..."

"Maybe they had found something interesting which we don't know, we can't exclude it" answered Keiichi "Something about the Syndrome, I mean, it's a subject nobody knows everything about. Maybe they were interested in the Swamp, or the air in this zone... They could have done... parallel researches, in these last years. While Irie-sensei was studying it alone with Takano-san, they were elsewhere, doing other experiments, funded by the _Tokyo _organization as well. Please note that in this manner they might ignore details about the parasite we're aware of... That's why they hadn't kidnapped Mion, that ATPC would have been too important to disregard, otherwise."

"And how might they have done these experiments, Kei-chan?" replied Mion "The parasite lives only inside human brain."

"I wouldn't know what to rebut... You know, they didn't trust Irie-sensei that much, so they could have asked someone else... and yes, do you remember him? That boy who had died some year ago, not far from the Hole in Yagouchi, with his father...*" Shion lowered her head, hearing those words.

"No, their corpses were intact, as far as I know, when they found them. And let's avoid to refer to the victims disappeared during the last years, we know the end of all of them, now. No, they didn't use human beings, if they had studied the Syndrome."

"But they could have used animals." observed Giancarlo "They use it in medical research, so... Mice, monkeys, or even pigs, which have a lot of diseases in common with men..."

"Could it be possible, could it?"

"I don't know, Rena-chan, we should ask Irie-sensei for it. However, I think it is possible, and-"

"Maybe I hadn't been clear enough earlier, but I don't think the Syndrome is the right answer" Mion interrupted him, again. "It would have been too complicated in my opinion. I'm looking for good ideas and strategies, not for a travel between the clouds, so please go on with something else."

"Well, so-"

"Could you wait a second, Satoshi-kun? There's something I need to arrange, before." Keiichi looked at Mion, who was staring at him, and so he asked directly "Why are you behaving that roughly? You are making all of us feeling uneasy."

Mion raised her head, as to give emphasis to what she was going to say, and then: "What are you talking about, now? There are much more important things than a discussion about my attitude, don't you agree?"

"Yes, but this is something I can't ignore. Do you think you will be able to help you, if you go on doing so?"

"So you really can't stand me, now? You're quite weak, I didn't imagine you could be scared by such a little problem. If I behave so, it's because I think it's the right choice to follow, don't you think? Or did you presume I'm acting so because of a caprice of mine?"

"Kei-chan is not wrong, Mii-chan, I had the same impression, too." replied Giancarlo "In these last days you've started being so serious, so... so cynical, sometimes. I can't say I've known you since you've been born, but in the last period your personality is completely different, and nobody of us likes this change, I fear."

"Oh, sure, the Lone Sparrow has just spoken. After what you have done last Sunday, you dare sermonizing me? Weren't you the one who had said _I'm sorry, I'm sorry_, in the end of your show?"

Rika eyed her friend, not believing to what she was saying. _Why she's behaving so? They are right, she's... she looks so angry, towards us. She seems not to consider us as friends anymore, either, maybe we are even like a problem, rather than a help, for her. She hated to be considered a tomboy by Keiichi, I know it very well, but this is not the right solution to her matter, and I thought she didn't mind it anymore. Is it possible that leaving Keiichi has caused these effects on her? Or are they... the effects of that protein? I hope it's not poisoning her, somehow..._

Unwillingly, Giancarlo's reply answered to her last question: "Yes, I must have hit a nerve... Are you so disappointed that you couldn't help your own village?" Mion opened wide her eyes, and Giancarlo grinned, noticing to have hit the bull's eye, so he went on: "Yes, you are thinking you had not been strong enough to protect them, you regret for that faint. And now you are convincing yourself you are stronger now, that you can face the next dangers, but the only result you're obtaining is to make us feeling like useless people, who are here by mistake. I have already seen what being harsh leads to, and you've already experienced you have not to be so, do you remember what had happened to you when Rika-chan was stalking us, and how much you were serious, that time? So please avoid this genre of behavior."

As reaction, Mion stood up impulsively, and while smiling ironically she came near to the boy who dared answering to her. He was staring at her, remaining sat on his legs. He was getting ready to defend himself from the girl's answer, which arrived soon: "Then do you know everything, little idiot? Do you know what the consequence of my behavior is going to be? Please enlighten me, so. But, if I well remember, you hadn't realized how your brilliant show would have ended, on Sunday, unless you ran away like a worm on purpose. And yes, Shion has already informed me about that absurd story your sister had told her... You hate people aggressive like me, don't you? They are hateful, you can't bear with them, with me, am I right?" she lowered, approaching her head by his and looking at him nearly, as to provoke him, and then she whispered in his ear "It will be funny, when you see what this behavior can arrange, and I watch you dying from envy."

"And are you going to do this alone?" Giancarlo attempted not to move, but instinctively he had turned his head slightly away from hers, extremely annoyed. Noticing it, he tried to avoid her glance, and he added "I'm not sure your friends will follow you, in this way."

"Why shouldn't they?" she stood up again, satisfied by that scene "I know I still need them, I'm unlike you, you pretended to do everything alone, and now you regret the outcome of what you've done, are you trying to forget it? I'm not going to make your same mistake, I'm only acting differently, as the situation requires, but you don't understand it. And this, despite my attempt to be friendly with you: do you remember what I did last Monday? I had demonstrated my superiority in a humorous manner, I had even laughed, to make you feel at ease, accepted by our group..."

"You had flung me to the ground, and you had hurt me. You couldn't think I would have appreciated it, immediately."

"This is what I was saying. You complain when I am joking, you complain when I am serious... what do you pretend, then?"

"So the problem is me?"

"... Yes, the problem is you." she answered, after a couple of seconds.

Giancarlo thought about an answer, which arrived after a little break: "I just don't understand these mood swings. And neither Kei-chan doesn't, you have heard him" he had lowered his eyes, as sign of defeat, but Mion didn't lose her hold.

"Yes... I don't like you. You are someone I can't appreciate, simply. You... you represent what I don't want to be. A man without any close friend, cold and insensitive. Someone who claims to want to do everything alone, but who doesn't figure he's obliged to do it in that pitiful manner, because he has nobody by him. And someone who finally can do nothing but regretting what he has done, because he can't do anything right. You... I'm sorry, but you are going to spend a miserable life, if you go on acting so, you won't have a moment of happiness, you will be always tormented by your doubts, because you have nobody to ask for advice. And I don't want to come to your same end, be sure of this." she grinned "But, to be sincere, you're really surprising me, now. I supposed you would have reacted, like how you did against Nabiha-san... I wanted to show you what's the real difference between you and I... What has happened? Maybe your sense of honor forbids you to attack a girl? Hmm?"

"Onee, you are really exaggerating, now" an arm interposed between them, It belonged to Shion "Don't you really understand why he didn't react? He didn't consider you as an enemy, at least not until now. That's why he limited himself to hear your words!"

Hence, Mion stared at the others. They all had different looks, but they all had the same meaning. Satoko and Satoshi were observing each other, uncomfortably, Rena's eyes were full of sadness, Rika and Keiichi were gazing at her, visibly angry. And Alice was keeping her glance towards the parquet of the hall, her fists closed and both of them leaned on one of her legs. All of them clearly agreed with Shion.

Still, she didn't surrender: "Oh, but he had however to react, somehow, don't you agree, Shion? His pride shouldn't allow him to stay so wordless. A friend shouldn't be that mean, and nobody would have had anything against a response by him. Moreover, he has to defend the pride of his family, but he seems not to care about it. Don't you think so? Don't you agree with me? Well, at least it has been a good way to show him what he can cause to the others, when he behaves like how he did last Sunday."

"You have just said you hadn't to act so, so why on the Earth..."

"Now stop, Shii-chan, you haven't to defend me."

Shion turned behind them, full of sadness and gloom. Giancarlo had stood up, but not to fight for his pride, and neither for himself. He was looking like renouncing to it, and he had asked her not to go on shouting. Therefore, he started to walk slowly towards the door, his gaze lost in space.

"As Shii-chan has told you" he said in a thready voice, without venturing to glance at them "I didn't want to quarrel, and I don't want either now, at least not with you. However, if you don't want me to stay in your village, you have only to say it, you are the ruler here, and I am only a guest. If you want so, I'm leaving right now."

"Nii-chan..."

"Nee-chan, could you go back home with me? I'd... I'd prefer not to walk alone, if possible." Without either waiting for an answer, he went though the entrance, and he left the hall, silently and slowly like a ghost.

Nobody talked, there was a heavy atmosphere inside the dojo. Till the moment when suddenly Rena perceived a quick air movement behind her, and she turned her head. But before someone could hint a reaction, they saw the blade of a sword touching Mion's neck. That was Alice. Indeed, after noticing the weapon hung up on the wall, she had taken it from that place, and fast like the wind she had directed it towards the one she had considered a friend until the end of that meeting. She was keen on fencing, and she knew how to use it, even if it was heavier than her foil. Mion was aware of it, too, and she had to be careful about what she was doing.

"Now listen carefully, _Sonozaki_" she shouted. Her hazel-colored eyes were full of wrath, her teeth were gnashing, and her voice sounded trembling, as if something was occluding her throat. It was not the voice of an angel, anymore. She really looked determined to cut Mion's throat, and the others feared that an attempt to block her could have lead to a shattering result. They had never thought that girl usually so joyful could become so violent.

"Ali-chan, what do y..." Alice's rabid glance was enough to silence Satoko, and then the Italian girl turned her eyes again towards Mion, who was looking to the floor, now, but who didn't seem to wish for a reconciliation.

"Hmm." she replied "I thought you were the calm and cheerful twin..."

"This doesn't forbid me to take care about my brother, _Sonozaki_" the way she had spelt the last word didn't leave any doubt about her mood "You've said you are aware of Nii-chan's story, haven't you? Well, let me say a thing, then. Nobody, in our family, will accept such attitude towards him. It's the strong sense of respect I had told you, and it's not due to the self-interest you are probably guessing. I, in particular, owe him a lot. And I've promised to myself that I would have done everything I could do, to give him a peaceful life, so don't ask me to choose between Hinamizawa and Nii-chan, my answer would be nothing but the latter."

"And so?" answered Mion, looking not impressed at all.

"And so... I will be as clear as possible. If something bad happens to him, my rage will force you to beg me to be demoned away, in the end, and I won't care about consequences."

She turned behind, after saying those menacing words, and while throwing the sword to the floor, she exited, slamming the sliding door of the dojo.

Nobody spoke for a period of time which seemed an eternity. Rika didn't know if blaming Mion, for her behavior, or Giancarlo and Alice, for their helpless reaction. Or the others, and herself too, for not having done anything to avoid that end. What had happened reminded her of when she was shadowing the Italian boy. _Seeing it from this point of view makes you really understand how mean I had been, in those days. And now Mion will have to realize it soon, too, otherwise..._ She swallowed, chasing away a scary idea _However..._ _Looking, and only looking, without moving, or speaking, or making yourself see... This is what we have done. They had shouted, and quarreled, and they maybe have become enemies... and they have done it as if we were neither present in their same room. I see, this is how Hanyuu had been feeling, in all those past worlds. It's frustrating. _The blue-haired girl looked at her invisible ancestor, who was sharing her same thought, and who didn't know what to answer.

So Rika turned her eyes towards Keiichi, who nodded immediately. There was only a thing they could do, for now. "Let's go and find Alice, we must talk to her and her brother as soon as possible, before it's too late."

"I don't understand why I should." replied the pony-tailed girl, staring at the closed door.

"Aren't you exaggerating now, Mion? Do you hate them so much? They didn't mean to offend you, you know that."

"That's not the point..." her voice started to sound broken "I'm beginning to think that they should avoid me for their own sake..."

"It's not true." answered Rena "And I am going to show you immediately. Let's go out, if I know her well enough, we'll soon run into her." The girl grabbed her friend's arm, and she dragged her for two or three hundreds meters outside the Manor, followed by the rest of the group.

"Please leave my arm, now! You can't treat me like a little kid!" Mion shouted, she was feeling tired, she wanted to go to his room, and stay alone, far from them, far from the whole world. But, as answer, Rena silenced her with her finger, and she pointed at a stone next to a tree. Hiding themselves behind a tall bush, they could see without been seen. Behind that bush, they saw Alice sat on that stone, crying desperately, while his brother, who had seen her too, was going towards her, to hug and relieve her.

"Ali-chan had told us... She is not able to become an aggressive girl, she has... left that role to Gi-chan. Rage is something absolutely alien from her nature, and now you can see it. She had left the room quickly because she knew she was already starting to cry, not because she was furious."

Rena eyed Mion, to see her reaction. Her friend was looking at those other twins, dispirited.

"I..." she finally whispered, closing her eyes shattered "I really don't know how to behave, with those two..."

* * *

***Keiichi is referring to what he has been told during Nekogoroshi-hen**

* * *

**Author's note: I know, Mion looks out of character, somehow... but in the next chapter I'm going to explain how I see her, I hope you're liking it.  
**


	26. Mirror

**26**** – ****Mirror**

_Hinamizawa, 23rd December 1983_

The road to go back from there to the Manor was short, but it turned out to be not a pleasant trip, for Mion. Her sister, having imagined what she was thinking, guessed that it was something she had to arrange alone with her, so she asked their friends to go away, claiming _Don't worry, I'm on it,_ and they obeyed, even if a bit reluctant. So, the Sonozaki twins entered their home again, and they went directly to Mion's bedroom. Shion was following her silently like a shadow, as to guard her, but at the moment she could only observe her. Once closed the door, the pony-tailed girl looked at the dark space around her, and she turned on a little lamp on her desk. It was getting late, and the Sun seemed cold and far as never before.

Slowly, Mion sat on the old chair she had used so many times in past, and she didn't say a word, closed in her thoughts. She was staring at the window, from which she could see the snow fallen in the previous days. Despite of Christmas time, that sight lowered her mood further on. _Why is it here? Who has sent it here? _She thought about all the movies and mangas where snow usually brings romanticism, calmness and serenity, well accepted by the various protagonists and characters. But this time it seemed an intruder, in that sad moment. Something painfully disrespectful to her sorrow. It was there, as if it was inviting her to play with it, another time. She had enjoyed with it very often, when she was a little girl, but it was likely the worst moment for it, and so all that panorama looked alike a hoax. Moreover... in that moment she didn't want to have fun for sure, but how many kids were happy for that white carpet, on the contrary of her? How many of them were playing outside with it, making snowmen, or throwing snowballs? Were they playing joyfully, and regardless of her feelings, too? She closed her eyes. _No, it's not true... Why everyone should be sad because of me? I can't force them not to be happy, it would be cruel. I'm lucky enough to have Shion next to me, in the end... Maybe she's even too much, I... I don't deserve her help._

Mion was visibly depressed, and Shion tried to call her name, to make her feel her presence. Therefore, the sad girl raised her watery eyes, and she asked simply: "Shion, will I ever be able to make something good, in my life?"

"You have already done a lot of wonderful actions, Onee. Why are you asking for it, now?"

"You're right, but I was referring to something different... I was thinking about how I behave with the others." She lowered her look, again, and then she added: "I don't know why I've acted so, I don't know why I have been so rude. It has been stronger than me, and I can't forgive myself for this, now. They will think I am a monster, and maybe what I've done will force them to go away. Being hated by the ruler of the village doesn't make your life easy, here."

"But you don't hate them, I guess, so there is not such a problem."

"There is, instead. It's sufficient that I've looked to do it, and now I don't know what they will think about me. They won't want to see me again, and it's only my fault. Batcha once had told me to leave the new fresh air enter the village, when she was still alive, but if I start to drive the newcomers out of it..."

"It's not true, and you know it!" exclaimed Shion, but her sister didn't reply. She was absent-mindedly observing a point of the wall, now, where there was the mirror she usually used to look at herself. From there, she could see that her sweater had somewhat hitched on an edge of the chair, and so the rear of the collar had been pulled, and it had slightly lowered. She hadn't noticed it in the beginning, her mood didn't allow it to her after all, but, in this way, she could glimpse a dark spot on the bottom of her neck, or at least it seemed so to her. She barred her eyes, to avoid that sight, and she immediately straightened her sweater. That little stain was a detail of the tattoo she carried on her back, of the mark which reminded her everyday who she was, in reality. She didn't want to think about it, now, she didn't want to admit yet she was evil like a Demon.

She looked at her sister, then. Shion was still looking at her, worried. She would never have left her alone before relieving her. The old Manor was not a comfortable place for troubled people, especially when the nocturnal darkness went down on its roof; Shion would have gone on cheering her up, and Mion was aware of it. So, the pony-tailed girl decided to speak. Hers was only a weak whisper, but in that silent room it would have been enough:

"Shion, do you remember when we spent our afternoons here, or at Kasai's home, talking about Kei-chan? When I was telling he was an interesting guy, talking about our school life... and fearing I was only a tomboy, for him. I thought that he was more interested more in having a girly partner, rather than one like me. And that idea was making me even more noisy and teasing, which had made things even worse, from my point of view. Now, while we were going back home, earlier, I've noticed a thing... Why am I behaving so only with Kei-chan? With the others I am not a great harasser, I like to do some joke with them, too, but..."

"Oh, I think Kei-chan is simply your favorite target. I don't see anything strange in this. Moreover, he's a male, he has never got really angry because of this. On the contrary, he has appreciated it, as sign of friendship."

"I know, and that's the point. I like to behave so with Kei-chan, but I wouldn't dare to do the same with Satoshi-kun, for example."

"And you'd better go on like this." Shion answered annoyed "If you try to hurt his fragile heart, I'll kick your ass from here to their home, to force you to apologize with him!"

Mion smiled melancholically, happy to see her sister trying to help her to raise her mood. However, she went on: "I know it... But I wonder why I haven't done so either before, when you didn't know him, and he was nobody special for you. When Satoko was a sad and lone girl, and I've created the Club, I had noticed that Satoshi-kun was depressed too. He needed a friend, exactly like Kei-chan. But, in that case, I had acted in a completely different way. No jokes, no tomboyish behavior... I looked... I looked a kind girl, simply. I remember I had often talked with him in a low voice, as not to hurt him. I feared that even speaking with my usual voice might cause harm to him. You know, he's only a few months younger than me, but I was really like an older sister, for him. And I know he thanked me for that."

"It's not strange. Satoshi-kun needs a different approach, and that was the right way to behave with him. Especially during that hard period, he couldn't afford to be manhandled also at school, and you had realized it, so you have changed your attitude in relationship to this. It's only because you have taken care of both of them, but it's not anything strange."

"Until some day ago I agreed with you. But now I have some doubt about this."

"Hmm?"

"I'm talking about what had happened at the prefecture, and after it. When I saw that boy fighting against Nabiha-san alone, and winning thanks to the rage he carries inside himself, I immediately thought it had been something marvelous, not so dissimilar from a miracle. But when he ran away, looking to regret what he had done... my impression was that he had used a bad way to reach a good aim. And I didn't like it. The following day, at school, I wanted to make him more involved in our activities, to show him the right way, that's why I had grabbed and floored him to the ground. Unfortunately, this was not enough, and not only for him, but also for me."

"What do you mean?"

"I started to think he was unrecoverable. That he would have never changed, that he would have never appreciated a friendly attitude. Don't ask me why, but I didn't want him to be next to our group. I feared that his attitude would have ruined the club." She lowered her eyes, uncomfortably "Even when I tried to joke, something inside me was distrusting him, and it was pushing me to be more... more aggressive towards him. It was pushing me to hate him. Without either noticing it, I started to copy his same behavior, no, I started to become even worse. I can't have fun and mock him as if he were Kei-chan... I'm feeling as if I'm in competition against him, as if I want to defeat him using his same weapons."

"And so were you trying to challenge him, today, when you started behaving that rudely? And what would have happened if he had accepted? Did you think to win?"

Mion reflected about it. She seemed to had neither thought about the result, and in fact she told: "I don't know, really. Mine has been an instinctive reaction, I guess. Just like a lion which protects his territory, and it doesn't matter if the enemy is another lion, a pigeon or a large group of poachers. It's driven by its instinct, which tells it what it has to do, and the probable final result of that fight becomes the least important thing."

"And you were making it because, from your point of view, he was trying to impose his view of the world and to delete yours, am I right? You were feeling like attacked by him."

"Attacked... Yes, it's the right word. I felt, and I still feel, the need to defend myself, even if I don't like this sensation. And I'd have liked to shout, and to fight as a real warrior... But I am able neither to get really angry. I can only look alike being so."

Shion looked at her sister for a while, then she looked above herself and she answered: "Well, I don't think it's a bad thing, what you've just said. Staying calm in every situation is a great gift."

Mion understood her sister's note, and she knew its real meaning. Her sister was extremely protective towards the ones she cared, like Mion herself, Satoko, Satoshi... but, even if to a slightly lesser extent, also the other members of the club, and many others. And if any external factor menaced one of them, she was ready to fight for them at once, getting quickly angry and aggressive if something seriously wrong happened. Shion used to lost her temper easily, she was aware of it, and she regretted that side of her nature, that's why she might talk about it knowledgeably.

However, she was wrong, and Mion tried to explain the reason: "I'm not speaking about being calm... You know, when the situation is critical I lose my control, too, simply it's not due to anger, but to something else. It's even worse than that."

"So, what should be the real cause of it?"

"Well... There have been cases where I didn't know what to do. And this had made me desperate. I remember..." she stopped, uneasily. In her mind had appeared the scene of her sister caught by the Yamainu, when they were in that cave, and at that time only Rika was able to save her. Mion hadn't been able to find another solution, and she couldn't do anything but crying, and hugging Satoko with her heart full of terror and anguish. That moment was so similar to the one at the prefecture... The plan she had arranged with the others' help had been defeated, and only an intervention by someone else had saved them. She suddenly felt stupid and useless, for one moment.

Mion looked at Shion, again, before adding: "Yes, there have been days when I feared to be the one wrong... But I couldn't accept that Gi-chan was right. It wouldn't be fair, it would be sorrowful for him, too. And this sensation made me similar to him, or at least to how I see him... I've copied him. Sometimes I ask myself if I really have my own character, or if I am only a mirror who copies the other. Kind with the kind Satoshi-kun, joyful with the joyful Kei-chan... rude with the... rude Gi-chan, I know it's not polite to describe him so, but this explains everything very well, in my opinion."

She added nothing else, but her thoughts were running fast, now. _Yes, this must be true... With the other inhabitants I am polite because they are polite with me, they recognize my role... And with Shion I like to quarrel, but because she likes to do it. And when... when I forced Shion to rip her nails... I was so cold and insensible, towards her... I was absorbing Batcha's character, in that moment, and mine had been as superscripted, I had been so weak, I was only able to force her to rip my nails too. And to get what? It had been helpless. _She looked at the mirror she had observed earlier, her mind full of doubts._ Who am I, really? Have I really my own nature, or I just go by how the others behave with me? Is this... an effect of that protein, maybe, a result of the ATPC inside my blood... inside my soul? So, is this a curse, rather than a bless? This story will drive me to desperation..._

She didn't realize she had said these last words aloud. She grasped it only when she saw Shion becoming suddenly sad, and she immediately got the cause of it. She had described the ATPC as a curse, but that same protein had saved Satoshi, and Shion now felt guilty of being happy thanks to her sister's disgraces.

"I'm sorry, I didn't intend to insult you, or causing you such a sorrow."

"It's all fine, Onee." she answered, smiling "I'm not unaware of your state of concern. It's absolutely normal."

Mion's mind restarted to be lost in her thoughts. _I wonder if she's as similar to me as we think. She has not spent a pleasant period in St. Lucia's academy, but she has learnt to defend herself. She has built her own character, unlike me. Maybe is it due to the fact she doesn't carry the ATPC? I wouldn't know what to answer... In the past she didn't speak a lot with the other people from Hinamizawa, she hasn't met them so many times, dressed as Shion. So she is free to take care only of someone, namely the ones who really matter to her. She would help the whole Hinamizawa only because this would mean helping me, perhaps, but finally she can choose what to do... I couldn't do such a thing, I couldn't take such a choice. Neither if I wanted to, my role imposes me to act for everyone's sake, even if I can't claim I dislike it, after all._

"Onee? Where are you? Is your mind traveling all around the universe?"

Mion hadn't noticed that her sister was trying to talk with her. "Shion, I'm sorry... But you could avoid to tease me, at least in these hard moments."

"Ah, to tell the truth I should be the one sorry, I couldn't help it." she laughed "However, I think you're wrong. Satoshi-kun is a quiet boy, but it's not the sitting duck you were describing. And Kei-chan is a challenging and strong one, but who has weaknesses too, and who can't do everything alone. And so Gi-chan, if I've understood him well enough he answers only if provoked, and only against people he doesn't esteem. You... you tend to catch only one side of their nature, in the beginning, and you focus only on that, when you have to decide how to behave with them. And then you regret the first steps of your relationship between you and them. Do you remember when you were regretting to have looked alike a tomboy to Kei-chan, and when you wanted to restart everything from the beginning, to show him your girly side? It's just the same. Do you want to be afraid to be considered a bad girl? If it isn't so, don't be afraid to change your mind, nobody will complain about it if you do it well."

"You're making it a bit too easy, now" answered Mion "I think it will be harder than how you're describing it." And then she smiled, to brace up. _I shouldn't worry that much about what the ATPC is doing inside me, I could never discover it anyway, unless Irie-sensei finds out the truth about it._ She looked at the mirror, again. This time, she wasn't alone. Shion had went next to her, and now two figures were reflected, instead of one. That sight reminded her she wasn't alone, indeed.

"However..." Mion added, "There's something else which concerns me."

"And what is it, now, Onee? Please show your inner feelings to your beloved sister, at once, without any sort of fear! What is it, then? Hair with split ends? Rings under your eyes? Some worrying lateness of your menstrual cycle?"

"I'm still serious, Shion, so please don't kid me!" the pony-tailed girl had closed her eyes annoyed, so the other twin decided to obey. Then Mion explained: "I remember, when Kei-chan had arrived to Hinamizawa and he had joined us, that a lot of people were interested in him. Immediately, after he had met them for the first time. Even Batcha, and Mom too... they had been aware of him since the very first day of his life here. That's why they weren't happy not to have received a visit from him, when he had arrived. They were a bit disappointed, but they kept a eye on him, even due to what I was telling them about him."

"They surely liked him..."

"And I know why. Young new villagers are great news, around here. There are not many boys around his age, here, and unluckily most of them go to Okinomiya's school, instead that to ours, so I wouldn't be surprised if they moved there, or somewhere else, once they've grown up. Without a decent number of young residents the village would disappear by a bunch of years, we all know it, so all of them were very happy to see him there, Kei-chan represented the future of Hinamizawa, once his family had decided to stay, and so they did have a future, as a matter of fact. But they were exaggerating, that was my opinion. And the fact he's a good mixer had increased this attitude. I remember... I remember I was getting envious."

"Really?" asked Shion, and Mion nodded.

"Yes. I didn't like how they were so pleased to talk with him, or even only to stay next to him. He was like a God, for them, but he neither belonged to one of the Three Great Families, so their praises sounded unnatural, to me. Maybe was it just because he was a boy, and I was a girl? I know that Batcha wanted a male heir, and that she had been disappointed when we had been born, but it wasn't fair anyway. Had I to become a boy, now? I even remember that I had wished for it in a loud voice, once, but it was a sort of joke in the end, I can't do anything with it for sure."

"And so? What had happened?"

"I had spent some night thinking at it... and I had realized that there was only a way to solve it. Grandma wanted to see the man who was destined to rule the family, one day, and Kei-chan had to belong to one of the Great Families, in order to reestablish this natural order."

"So... had you fallen in love with him because of these feelings? Had it been... a choice you had made on your own, and nothing else?"

"Yes and no. It hadn't been love at first sight, that's right. But that first _artificial_ spark had been the real beginning of it. While knowing him better, and trying to win his heart, I started to love him seriously. You know, he do is a great and very interesting boy, and he carries a considerable charm, all the Angel Mort's waitresses care a lot about him, you surely have noticed it too. Perhaps it has been the wrong way to start an important relationship, but what could I do, then? Maybe that day at the prefecture has only given me a hand. It has shown what that story really was – only a simple calf love, and nothing more."

"You are too severe with yourself, now. Your feelings were sincere, and you mustn't blame yourself. And who has said it's all over, between you, now? Are you going to surrender after only the first crisis?"

"That's not the point, Shion... There's something else."

With a simple glance, Shion asked her sister what was the matter, and Mion answered: "Last Sunday, at the prefecture, I had seen him not surrendering to the Evil, and show his inner nature. Full of rage, but also full of strength and belief in his own abilities. He knew what he was doing, even when the situation looked compromised and irreversible. He didn't surrend, on the contrary of what I did."

"And so..." Shion opened her eyes wide.

"So, after everything had ended, I was a bit angry with Gi-chan, but I was also envying him, just like I envied Kei-chan in the past, even if for a different reason. And I'm still envying him." she took a pause, looking confused, then she added: "But I don't want to do the same mistake. Gi-chan and I have nothing in common, a love story between us would never work, and moreover he has to go back to Italy next summer. Furthermore, Rena is spending a lot of time with him and his family in last period, she has arrived before me even if I wanted to challenge her. So I'd better to choose another path, another way to silence this envy, hopefully a better one. What would you do if you were me, Shion?"

…

The little crèche above the fireplace really suited the silence present in the living room. The penumbra generated by the turned off lights, moreover, stressed the melancholy of that environment, and invited Giancarlo not to talk, and to look around wordless. Finally, he didn't want to speak, and in the room there was nobody to talk with. After a dinner consumed inside an unreal atmosphere, Alice and he had talked about what had happened, and her sister, in particular, had feared that he wanted to go back home that same evening. Her brother preferred not to answer to her question, he wanted to take a few time to think about it. After that dialogue, she had to go away, Rena had called for her at her home, claiming it was something important, and she asked her to come alone, so she had left him there, absorbed into his reflections.

At home, he thought, he had never had a great number of friends, among his classmates and the boys of his own age. He was used to talk with older people, and he considered relationships with the younger ones _not important, not necessary_. Why had he been thinking that in Hinamizawa it would have been different? The adults of the village had a good feeling with him, he had helped them to solve quite a high number of problems concerning economical or technical issues, but, on the other hand, he had already quarreled with Rika some week before, and now he had done the same with Mion. What would have happened at school, after winter break? He concluded that he'd better to stay in a corner, until the end of the period of his residence there. But would it have been a reasonable idea? Shouldn't he rather go back to home at once, instead? But this would have meant recognizing to be a weak, and he couldn't allow himself to be so...

He looked at the phone. It was nearly 9 PM, there was a high chance that someone from Italy had been going to call, like what sometimes happened, to know what was going on there. _First the matter with Rika, then the one with Nabiha, now this... They're thinking I am nothing but a scrappy, I fear._ He'd have liked not to talk with anyone, but he would have been forced to, if the phone had rung. _I can't really be a good leader... I can only cover up for the others. I can't avoid the Evil to reach me, I can only be able to keep it far from the others. I... I will be always an unhappy man, in the end, but I must be strong, I must be ready to face what Life has reserved to me._

Suddenly, he turned his head with a start, because of a sound. Nevertheless, it was not the phone, but the door bell. It couldn't be Alice, she had left home only some minute before, and she would have never rang, she would have entered directly. So, become curious, he reached the door, after having turned on the lights, and before opening it he looked through the peephole, to see who was it.

He gasped, shocked for an instant. _M-mion?_ His first reaction was to go far from the door, and not to answer, pretending that the house was empty. If she had been there Alice would have never liked to talk with her, after what had occurred at the Manor. But he quickly changed his mind, he had to be mature. _She's here to apologize? She looks dejected, but... I don't want to talk with her, now._ He touched the door with his right hand, and he waited for some second. No further sound. Mion didn't ring the bell a second time, she was standing motionless in front of the door, keeping her glance low. _She's going to renounce to see me, if I don't answer, then? Is she going back home, now?_ However, while still deep into these fears he started unlocking the door, and opening it. _It's still my duty to see what she wants to say. It's the right thing to do, they have taught me so._

Mion entered slowly, without either greeting. She reached the center of the room, and she waited for him to close the door again. Then she asked if he was alone, and the other nodded, explaining where Alice was.

"I see..." she just commented, looking at the crèche Giancarlo was staring at earlier. Then she added: "It wouldn't be a nice Christmas Time, for you, in your actual situation doesn't change quickly, am I right?"

The other boy didn't know what to answer. _Is she still mocking me? Or there is a more serious reason for her to come here? And why she has asked if I was alone?_ He tried to look at her eyes, to get her intentions, but she was turning her back to him, and her low glance didn't allow him to do it. So he started to walk towards her, to find out her last aim.

"Please don't move." she replied, noticing it "I'm here for only a reason, and then you'll be free to chase me away, if you want to." She turned back towards him, and she quickly knelt, staying nearly laid on the floor, and keeping her head low.

"_I'm sorry_" she shouted, desperately crying as a baby "_I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry..._" she went on so for more than a minute, before adding something else. Then she slowly raised her head, looking at him, then she rubbed her eyes with a hand, to wipe away her tears, and she explained: "You know, Shion had suggested me to apologize as soon as possible, and I agree with her, I don't want to cause sorrow to you, or to Ali-chan, I'm going to talk with her too." She rubbed her eyes again. Despite of her will, they were still dropping bitter tears, and she wasn't able to stop them. And her words were full of regret, too: "You'll see it, I'm going to be a good girl, from now on... I want to make up for what I have done to you, why don't you come with us to Okinomiya's leisure center with us, tomorrow? It's going to be a nice day, I promise..."

Giancarlo was not that happy to see her asking for his forgiveness. He was very embarrassed by that scene, and, realizing his friend state of mind, he tried to make her feel more at ease: "Mii-chan, I'm happy you wanted to make peace, it's all OK now, it's just like nothing has happened, and there's nothing you should apologize for..."

"Don't you want to come with us? Have you already some engagement? Maybe because it's Christmas eve, and you have to meet some relative or friend somewhere..." she asked, visibly worried.

"N-no, besides the Keresanas we have not intimates in Japan, if you insist we'll be glad to join you, but you mustn't humiliate yourself in this way."

"It doesn't matter. I don't want you to hate me, I don't want you to hate anybody, here. It's being a wonderful day, tomorrow. I'm going to be a good girl..."

The boy helped her to stand up again, and he invited her to drink a cup of hot chocolate, but he was still worried. Her voice was still full of sorrow, and while going from the living room to the kitchen he could hear her repeating those words. _I'm going to be a good girl, I'm going to be a good girl, I'm going to be a good girl... _That was what she was saying, in an endless and disturbing cycle.


	27. Battle of the Underdogs

**27**** – ****Battle ****of ****the ****Underdogs**

_Okinomiya, 24th December 1983_

"Ah, spending Christmas Eve far from your birth town..."

Alice's comments rang out inside the room. She was, together with the whole club, in one of the littlest rooms of the leisure center. It couldn't contain a larger group than theirs, but at least it had been reserved only to them, for the whole afternoon, nobody would have entered during the period they would have stayed there. The place was slightly bigger than a karaoke room, and a very large table stood in the middle of it, covered by an enormous bluish sheet which nearly touched the floor, and which could trip someone, if they weren't careful. It was occupying most of the space, but it was still a cosy environment: quiet, warmed, and with a couple of plants in two of its corners, and more exactly the ones farthest from the entrance door. And there were chairs enough for them, so they couldn't complain.

"So, what are we going to do, here?" asked Rika.

"Do I need to say it?" answered Keiichi "Be ready, because this afternoon will be dedicated to all sorts of games. Yes, today you're going to be involved into the start of the renowned Hinamyziads!"

"And you have already won a gold medal for the Worst Name Ever, Keiichi-san. _Hinamyziads_ sounds simply awful. Moreover, we can't label it so, a full event would include outdoor games, too."

"It's too cold outside, we can't do that. Consider it as an indoor meeting, there are so many of them during the year."

"Still, you'd rather find a better name for it. _Hinamyziads _is quite stupid, exactly like the boy who has thought it up."

"So why don't you think about a better one, Satoko." he went towards her, with a menacing glance "Or has the Trapmaster no imagination at all, to accomplish such a task?"

"You're lucky than it's the first time I come to this room" she answered, cocky and not intimidated at all "Otherwise I'd have locked your mouth for the rest of the day with an effective and unrestrainable chain of tricks, fitting to this purpose."

"And in your opinion why are we here, instead of going somewhere else? I have taken care of all these important details!"

"Oh, so this villain looks to start growing up, little by little..."

"This is what the others call _experience_. However, let's go at once to the most important matters. What should we arrange as punishment for who comes last?"

"What about forcing him to wear only red underwear and a long beard, making him wandering through the village pretending to be Santa Claus? Until... until 8 PM, it's a reasonable time I think. That kind of show would be nice, extremely nice."

"Oh, Rena loves Shii-chan's idea! He will be so cute, I'm bringing him hoooooome!"

"Hey, why have you said _him_? Do you think I will be the loser, won't you? This won't happen, for sure! Put it out of your head!"

"However it's a bit too exaggerated." commented Alice "I don't want anyone of us to die from a pneumonia, tonight it's going to be a frosty one."

"Nah, Kei-chan is a tough boy, he won't suffer this punishment as much as you think."

"Ah-ha, Shion! Here you are, you have made that choice because you were sure it would have been up to me! But you're going to regret being so self-confident!"

"If I was given I cent each time I had heard this... Don't you agree, Onee?"

Mion didn't answer. She was smiling at them, like a girl who had just run into them, and who had been made curious by those strange individuals. Then, she said: "If you say so... However, I think Alice had got a point, it's a bit cruel to force him to do so..."

Those words clamorously clashed with her usual attitude, and the others immediately noticed it, not being pleased by them. Shion and Satoshi had arranged that afternoon to make Mion make peace with Giancarlo and Alice, but also to raise the pony-tailed girl's mood. Shion had been informed about what her sister had said the previous evening at the Sercos' house, and she didn't like it. She thought Mion had exaggerated, misinterpreting her suggestion, and she didn't want her to denaturalize her own nature, looking a so gentle girl didn't belong to her, or rather it didn't belong to her when she was together with the whole club. It was unusual, and maybe even dangerous for her.

Therefore, she started to walk towards her, to check how she was, but someone preceded her. Alice was in front of Mion, now, and she didn't move from it. She wasn't averting her gaze from that girl, she was like canvassing her. The Italian girl started to look at her legs, then she raised slowly her eyes, until reaching her head, and her eyes in particular. She went on observing them for a while, as if she was trying to catch her feelings, and to understand what she was thinking. To be honest, she was not the only one, that strange Mion had got everybody's attention; but she was the only one showing it so explicitly, and she seemed the most interested. However, the object of her analysis felt uncomfortably, and she asked her if there was something wrong about her.

"No, nothing, I was simply curious." she answered "I just thought it's strange."

"What do you mean?" Mion replied, but Alice limited herself to smile, and to move away from her. And turned at Keiichi she stated it was time to start. She took a deck and sheet of paper from a notebook into her bag, and she wrote everyone's name on it.

"We agreed about playing seven games, didn't we? Let's not waste any further time, we must start with the first one!"

"So have you brought your own deck, Ali-chan?"

"Oh, sure. It will be interesting to see how you behave with cards with no marks. And this is not going to be the only difficulty for it. Take some card, and you'll see what I'm talking about."

Rena did what Alice had suggested, and she was wowed by astonishment: "But what kind of cards are these?"

"Do you like them? You know, the ones you're used to play with are the so-called French deck, the most famous one by far. But it's not the only one: during the past centuries, a lot of Italian cities had drawn their own one, as well as many other towns from all over Europe. And they are completely different from each other, and from the French one. In this last deck the suits are hearts, clubs, spades and diamonds, but in the one you're holding they are coins, swords, cups and clubs. And clubs, which are the only suit present in both of them, carry a design which has nothing in common with the ones you know."

"But why are you saying this will make things harder?" asked Keiichi, before looking at them too. Then, he observed them deeply, and he added, starting to realize: "Wait, where are the Queens? And what card is this...?"

"There are no Queens in this deck." answered Mion "You know, in the past I had a similar deck at home, together with all the other games. They had given it to me as present when I was a little girl, but exactly I don't know where it is now, I must have lost it somewhere. I'm sorry, I'm such a messy woman sometimes." She smiled, closing her eyes, gently and politely. She somehow looked alike Rena, maybe she was trying to copy her, but that sight seemed unnatural, like the previous one. Shion was deeply worried, it was maybe the first time that she was worried to be in front of a kind person.

She wouldn't have surrendered to it, she had to help her to show her true ego, and Alice supported her: "Sure, Mii-chan, there is not any of them here, and it's not the only problem, for who is not used to this deck. I'm going to teach you some game we play at home with this deck, for example... well, _Briscola. _For us it's simply like what the Mahjongg is for you Japaneses, everyone knows it in Italy, and nearly all the older people have spent whole afternoons and evenings playing it. Are you ready, then? You're going to regret to have accepted my proposal. It will be funny to see how the Queen of the Games behaves, in a game where no Queens are contemplated..."

Three games later, on the table of the room there was the sheet Alice had taken previously, with everyone's score. For each game, the winner had given ten points, the runner-up eight and so on until the last one, who obtained only one point. And the numbers written on it clearly said that, until that moment, Maebara Keiichi was the loser with only 4 points.

"It's not fair! I couldn't know which each card was, you did nothing but confusing me!" He wasn't totally wrong, Alice, Giancarlo and Mion had a significant advantage, since they were used to play with it. Even without any mark, they could have some idea about the others' cards, especially Keiichi's ones: in that deck there were some card easily recognizable, like the Aces, and other ones much more confusing, like the Fives or the Sevens. It was enough to see how much time he stared at them to understand their value, to have some hint about the cards he was holding

"Ara ara, this poor villain will never be able to win, no matter which deck we use. Do you think I was in a better situation than you?"

Keiichi stood up at once, hurt in his pride. He eyed his fierce opponents, without either thinking about a capitulation, and he claimed: "OK, now things are going to get serious. Let's take our usual deck, and you'll have to face my revenge!" He grabbed the deck he had always known, and he showed it to them, as if it was the reason of his pride, the source of his sureness: "Let's start at once! I can't wait to see you and the punishment I'm planning for you!" He shuffled it, full of energy, and he dealt the cards.

Other four games later, the Hinamyziads were over. Mion, who was still behaving gently but who had not forgotten how to play, had won the games, leading the overall standings, followed by Shion, Satoko, Alice, Rika, Giancarlo, Rena, Satoshi. And the last one, with only 9 points collected, was strangely Maebara Keiichi.

"Ah, I wanted to win!" complained Shion "Unfortunately Onee had taken an unbridgeable advantage, during the first half of the afternoon. It's not fair to play with a deck you know very well, on the contrary of me." She didn't tell it just to moan about something. At playing card games she was even better than Mion, they had played alone at their home, and they already knew it. But she had never played at the full of her skills when her sister was with them, after all the most important thing was to make Keiichi lose, during the various activities. She was used to stick in it only when she switched her role with her, and she was with them with Mion's clothes and hairstyle. She had to protect her sister's role, finally. "Well", she said then "However I'm going to have a satisfying compensation for it, don't you agree with me, Kei-chan..."

She took a little paper bag, and she opened it. Inside it, there was a white long beard and a box, on which they had written _The best underclothing for the New Year's night! Don't forget to attract luck for the incoming year! _Shion grinned, showing it to the luckless boy, who immediately realized her intentions and tried to run away towards the exit. But he couldn't do it, Satoko and Rika had preceded him, and they were now blocking the way.

"Kei-chan..." Shion whispered, foretasting that future sight.

"P-please..." Keiichi shouted, as if he was in front of the Demon of Death. But he was saved by the sudden opening of the door.

"Hi, guys, is it everything fine, here?"

"No, it wasn't, until now, Domiro-san. Thanks for coming in the right moment, you have just saved my life."

Rika, hearing the name of the middle-aged man who had just entered, realized that Keiichi already knew him, but she didn't. _Could he be a friend of his father? _Very short and black hair, a pair of glasses with thin lenses. Quite tall and slim, wearing very formal clothes apparently despite of the environment they were in. His arrival was unexpected, she didn't know him, so she asked her for his name.

"Rika-chan, haven't you recognized him?" exclaimed Shion "He's uncle Domiro, the official lawyer of the Sonozaki family. You have met him at the prefecture some time ago, don't you remember?"

"Ah..." Rika nodded, a bit sorry for having completely forgotten him, and then she smiled "Nice to meet you again, then. Nippa~!"

"Another uncle?" commented Satoko "I remembered about him, but you hadn't told me it was a relative of yours. But how many of them have you, Nee-Nee?"

Shion laughed, amused: "Well, personally neither I know their exact number. Our clan has branches unknown to everyone, perhaps there are people in the countryside who don't know to be a Sonozaki... It was our old policy to get your relatives married with people of as many families as possible, to increase our power and influence, and so here they are..."

"But why is he here? Why is he? Rena wants to know."

"Oh, he's a lawyer, but he's also the administrator of the leisure center. You know, our family has a role in a lot of activities, here. Of course, this is not a big business, you don't earn money from a public structure, but, that's always a mark of distinction, a way to enforce Onee's authority..."

"You shouldn't tease me in this way, Shion." answered Mion, politely yielding.

"So?" asked Domiro "Are you enjoying the place?" then he looked at the table, and he looked slightly surprised "Oh, but haven't you used it yet? Which games have you played, then?"

Shion asked what he meant, and he lifted the sheet, folding it accurately, and afterwards he asked Keiichi to help him to remove the wooden plank laid on the table, which was not a normal table in reality.

"Oh, my!" exclaimed Keiichi "But it's a billiard table!"

"Hadn't you noticed it? Well, I can see... This long sheet covered it, and so it seemed just an old piece of furniture. Wait a moment, now, beneath it there should be a drawer... Here it is." He opened it, and he took a couple of sticks, a little blackboard to write the score on and a huge number of balls. Then he added "Why don't you play it for a few time? It's still early, and it would be funny."

"Ok... but can someone play billiards, here?" asked Satoshi. "I'm used to my baseball bat, but I'm never held one of those in my hands."

"I can't."

"I can't."

"Neither I."

"Just the same. And you, Mii-chan?"

"I've never played billiards, to be honest." she answered.

"Oh, it's strange. Rena thought you know the rules of every game."

"I don't, instead. Well, a billiards match is reserved to two players, so I wasn't interested in it, after all." She wasn't lying. When she had decided to create the club, she was not a great player, so she had to learn. But she had focused on the games where more than two players were involved, because they would have never considered the other ones, they would have never had a chance to play them. That was why billiards had been excluded. But she could take some lesson whenever she wanted. And all the others were intentioned to make her start right in that moment.

"But..." she objected "There's nobody who can teach me..."

"I can." answered Domiro, stripping his jacket off "First..."

"No, wait. You should teach two of us at least, otherwise I wouldn't have an opponent."

"Here I am, then!" exclaimed Keiichi "I am always ready to face these new challenges. Let's start at once!" By the way, it was also a way to avoid the expected punishment, so he was killing two birds with one stone.

More than an hour passed. Mion and Keiichi looked to learn the basics of that sport very fast, carefully observed by the others' gazes. Domiro, satisfied, decided to stretch his arms, and he made a proposal:

"Listen, why don't you play a match between you two? We will play following the rules of the 15-ball pool, one point for each pocketed ball, but with a little change: once the cue ball is the only one on the table, we put all the others on the table again, disposing them in the starting position, until one of you reaches 80 points. Do you agree?"

Both of them nodded, even if Mion was still hesitant. But Satoko decided to interfere, reminding what had happened before. She took the sheet reporting the standings of the previous games, and she said: "Have you forgotten, Keiichi-san? You still have to go through the punishment of the previous activities, and in spite of this do you want to play something else as if this sheet of paper has never existed?"

"And what's the problem, Satoko? If you prefer so, we can come to an agreement. The double, or nothing. If I win this match, nothing will happen to me, but if I lose, I'm going to wear it on Christmas Day, too! Don't you like this idea?"

Apparently he was signing his condemn, facing the Queen of Games in that way was a suicide. "Well, if you are pleased so..." Satoko commented, sitting on her chair again.

"Very good. Let's start!" he shouted, full of agonistic force.

"Very bad... Let's stop..." he cried, five minutes later. The score, written on the blackboard, said 43 points for Mion, 17 for Keiichi. "It's not fair, it's not fair at all, why am I so unlucky? It would have been enough to have some fortunate counterblow, and I..."

"And you would have lost, anyway." replied Shion "You can't defeat Onee in a game you both have just learned to play. She's able to grab the secrets of any activity in an incredibly short period. So, do you know what are you going to dress, soon?" Keiichi didn't turn towards her, but he knew she was holding that scary box containing his future underwear. So, he preferred to observe Mion, figuring himself at the mercy of that group of harpies, frozen as an icy statue.

The pony-tailed girl was aiming at the next ball, in that moment. She had noticed Keiichi's mood, and she waited some second, before hitting the cue ball. And, immediately after she did it, the supposed unlucky boy noticed that she had used a not sufficient strength, and the white ball stopped just by the one she had to pocket, leaning on it softly as a caress.

"Oh, I've made a mistake." she said, smiling "It can become a great chance to catch up with me, Kei-chan."

"Sure, you shouldn't do it!" he declared, recovering his boldness, and scoring quickly a new point. "And now..."

But Satoshi stopped him, suddenly: "Mion-san, I felt the sensation you had missed that on purpose... You know, I have already seen that attitude of yours, when Satoko was very little and I played with her I couldn't engage seriously, and I was used to do the same thing you have just done. I hope to be wrong, but..."

Shion stared at him, extremely surprised. She couldn't believe to what her boyfriend had said, but seeing her lowering her head and blushing from shame was the confirm of it. She approached her, and she asked her why.

"Well..." she answered, slowly and keeping her head low "I thought it was cruel towards Kei-chan, and I didn't want to be mean, so it was better to..."

"No, it was not better!" she replied "You have never let him win, you have never let anyone win, against you! Why are you changing so drastically, now?"

Mion didn't answer, and Shion too preferred not to add anything. She limited to murmur: "Well, we should stop it right now, I don't feel like going on."

Rika looked at her friend, uneasily. She was used to see her friends to behave in a strange way, in the past, but not so calmly, on the contrary. The Syndrome made them violent, aggressive, even cruel. They didn't mean to be so, but the disease inside them, combined with their sorrows and fears, was stronger than them. But why now was Mion so depressed? The suspicion brought by the ATPC appeared again in her mind. She turned at Hanyuu who stood next to her, and who paid back her glance.

"I know what are you thinking about, Rika." Both of them they were recalling the memories of Satoko's old disease. When Teppei was with her, she behaved unnaturally kindly, pretending to be fine, and she went on telling not to worry about her, but they knew it was false._ Now, what would happen if Mion starts to claim the same? This damn Syndrome seems not to leave us rest..._ That Syndrome, that Syndrome. It was the bee in her bonnet, that scary ghost was haunting her mind so strictly that she wanted to chase it away someway. And so another idea appeared in Rika's mind. _No, it's not right. After all, people can go crazy even for other reason. Hinamizawa's Syndrome is not the only cause of people's breakdowns, and neither the ATPC is. Could it be something not related to it at all, so? It would be... not a bad thing, in the end. We could do much more to help her, it wouldn't be an irreversible phenomenon, likely._

Alice noticed that Rika was deep into her thoughts, and she was troubled too. So, she started pushing her brother: "She had said you were the problem, yesterday, hadn't she? Now find a way to help her."

"And what do you think I can do?" he muttered. But Alice didn't consider his answer, and she raised her hand.

"I have a proposal... Let's make a substitution. Kei-chan, you have fought very well – despite of how much Satoko-chan is laughing while hearing my words. Why don't you let Nii-chan have a try?"

"But I've never played billiards!"

"So have they, until today. And this is not weight lifting, you could even have a chance to win. Moreover I'm sure you have observed carefully them during their match, and you have some idea about this game."

He looked at her, puzzled, but she had convinced him. He asked Keiichi to give his cue, and he put the cue ball where it was before Mion's last hit.

"Try again, Mii-chan" he said "You have missed it on purpose, before, I can't accept this advantage. We will start from the score you've reached until now."

"I don't want to start with such a..."

"It's not a problem, Mii-chan. I'm willingly doing it, so you shouldn't concern about it."

"Why don't you take my punishment too, then?" protested Keiichi, but Shion and Satoko hushed him at once.

"Your punishment is a matter between Shii-chan and you, we are not involved in it." he answered, lying. It was Mion who had won the Hinamizyads, and she had to be the one who could take the last choice. But she wouldn't have decided for anything, with her actual mood, so the other girls wouldn't have minded to take her place. Therefore, Giancarlo kept on talking, this time to Mion "However, traditions must be respected, and you are not used to play games without penalties, am I right? So, we should arrange another one, indeed. What do you propound?"

"I've said I don't want to punish you, or anyone else. Why do you want me to become cruel?" she started to sob, unable to find a more suitable reaction. Giancarlo approached her, and he stopped when he arrived right in front of her. Mion keeped her eyes low, and he couldn't see them. So, he took a deep breath, and then he told:

"Mion-chan, why do you really want to be my friend?"

She looked at him, a bit surprised by that question, while he went on: "I think you were expecting another genre of try to relieve you, something similar to _You __haven't __to __behave __so, __Be __yourself __and __you'll __be __happy, __We __are __here __to __help __you, __We __like __you __as __you __have __always __been __and __you're __not __forced __to __change, _and so on. Be careful, I'm not saying these sentences are false, on the contrary I do believe they are the simple truth, but everybody here can say them to you, and probably you are already aware of them, inside of you. So I am going to say something else." he put his cue on a border of the table, and he leaned against the latter, trying to find the best words to express what he wanted to say.

"Mion-chan" he finally told "I am not a friendly person, I know it very well, and I'm not going to query it. It's not easy for me to take a liking on somebody. And certainly I can't do it on you, if you go on behaving so. Do you think I could be friend of a girl who is denying her own nature?"

"And what's my own nature?" she asked "Sometimes I think not to have one. Sometimes..." she paused "Sometimes I think not to be... not to be normal. You have already noticed it, I'm sure of it, with someone I am kind, with someone else I am rude..."

Mion had already told him about her reflections of the previous day, the ones she had made while she was with Shion in front of her mirror. So those words didn't sound new to him, but this meant also that he had thought about an answer.

"Have you ever tried to find a common denominator for them?"

She looked at him, puzzled by that strange metaphor. She had never liked math.

"What are you saying, now?"

"I mean... think about your behavior towards Kei-chan, the one towards Satoshi-kun and the one towards me... there are really no similarities at all, in your opinion? I don't think so. There's something you always show, in each case."

"And what is it?" she asked at once, with a shroud of anxiety.

Giancarlo smiled: "It's sufficient to see the reason why you have acted so, during all this time. You wanted all of us to settle here as well as possible, and make us build a strong bond with you and the others. You wanted Satoshi-kun to feel alike less secluded from the others, you wanted Kei-chan to feel at ease, and so did you towards me. I suppose that, in my case, you have unconsciously thought that rudeness was a good way to deal with me. It's normal to conform a bit to the other's habits to meet his needs."

"I don't understand."

"So I will make things simpler. You want nobody of us to be alone. By using any mean, you want nobody to stay far from the others. You want to create a group which involve all of us, and in the end it doesn't matter if this "group" is a place where you can play or fight. For you it's enough we are all together, to share our own feelings and experiences."

_I __wonder __if __Gi-chan __is __right, _thought Shion. It was plausible, after she had been marked with the tattoo on her back she had lived alone with Batcha, without nearly any friend at all. Rika and Satoko were too little to become real intimates, Satoshi wasn't a sociable boy, and he had his own problems, the others were far from Hinamizawa... She had nobody to talk with. Shion had a harsh period at the Academy, too, but at least she had some friend she could confide with. Her sister had been alone, instead, like confined inside her Ivory Tower, and her fears had to stay inside her heart, making her timorous. And so, creating the Club, talking with everyone, and so on... it was all a way to prove to herself she was there, that she was alive and happy, and that her period alone had been finished. _It __must __have __been __hard __for __her, __poor__ Onee._

"So" ended Giancarlo "Have you understood, now? If you go on behaving so, pretending to be polite and ignoring what we are doing around you, you're doing something absolutely unrelated to what you have done before. Feel free to do what you please, but now you are doing something you probably dislike, don't you? You're nearly trying to isolate yourself, now."

She didn't raise her head, embarrassed. "I just wanted..."

"...to make the others happy, I know it. But you can't do it alone. Immolating yourself won't make us happy, if we have a bit of sensibility we couldn't be so, while seeing you in this condition. Changing slightly your behavior in relationship to who is in front of you is a good thing, but even the others have to do the same, don't you agree? Mine would be only the pretense of a sacrifice, otherwise." He took the stick again, using it as a sword and directing it at Mion's head "That's why I'm challenging you, now, and I'm going to accept the penalty you want me to be subjected."

"Is it so?" she answered, grasping her stick.

"Sure. I don't like this kind of hard-bitten competition, and personally I'm not enthusiast to see the loser punished, instead of having a prize for the winner, but I'm willingly accepting it, since all of you prefer this system. So, it was your turn to hit the cue ball, and I have a ton of points to recover, so let's hurry!"

Mion smiled, convinced. "Well, if you want this old lady to spank your ass, you're welcome..." Maybe it was just because Giancarlo was trying to copy Keiichi's attitude, but in that moment Mion had recovered her whole strength. She aimed at the ball she had to pocket, and she declared: "Since it's a 1vs1 fight, the loser will have to drive the other at home."

"It doesn't seem hard, but with which car?"

"I have never talked about a car, have you seen that old tandem next to the door, when we had entered? The chain is slightly rusty, but it won't be a problem for me, because the winner won't pedal for either a meter..."

"Oh, my... But it's already late, sky is dark outside!"

"Are you regretting to have told me those cheering words, aren't you?"

"No..." he answered, a bit frightened by his plausible future effort "I was taught to take responsibility for what I do, so here I am, let's go on."

Some seconds later, the score said: Mion 45 points, Giancarlo 17. But now it was his turn to hit. He stood next to the cue ball, without moving. He was reasoning. _Alice __had __told __me __it, __this __is __not __weight __lifting, __and __neither __a __battle __with __water __guns... __I __have __to __use __my __brain, strategy can become decisive, here. __Mion __hardly __ever __makes __a __mistake, __and __this __has __allowed __her __to __take __the __lead __and __build__ such __an __advantage, __but __she __only __executes __basic __hits, __nothing __more __than __what __Domiro __has __taught __her during the last hour. __I __have __seen __how __they __hit, __I've __followed __Domiro's __lesson too, __so __I __have __to __put __it __into __practice, __and __not __only __it, __if __I __want __to __have __a __chance __I __have __to __calculate __where __each __ball __goes, __and __something __else..._

He had to hit the red ball marked with the number three, now. He could pocket it quite easily, but with a normal shot the following one would have been nearly impossible to deal with, the cue ball would have stopped behind a group of balls he couldn't touch, and they would have been an obstacle impossible to pass. He lowered himself, and he aimed at the cue ball, directing his stick at the bottom right zone of it, instead that at the center of it.

"What are you doing?" exclaimed Mion "You mustn't hit it in this way, it will go in another direction! Haven't you listened what Domiro-san had told him?" She turned at her uncle, who didn't answer. That strange pose made him interested.

"Perhaps... is he planning to give it an effect... And maybe..."

He made his shot, the white ball hit the cushion before aiming at the ball number three, which was reached and pocketed. Then, the cue ball went strangely back, as pulled by a mysterious force. It stopped after a couple of seconds, in a zone from which it could be directed towards the ball number 4, without any obstacles between them.

"Wow. How is it possible?"

"Mion-san, he has executed a particular shot. Hitting the cue ball in the bottom zone gives it that particular effect, and so it goes back once having hit the other ball. But I thought you had never played billiards, Serco-san."

"And you're right, indeed. But it was enough to know something about physics, and a touch of intuition. But basically" he added, grinning with a pinch of irony "I've used the old good equations Mii-chan loves so much..."

Mion diverted her gaze from him, annoyed, so he could went on. But after some good shots, he missed the ball number 11.

"Oh, what a pity..." he exclaimed downhearted, while it was the pony-tailed girl's turn to laugh.

"Well, you shouldn't blame yourself" Domiro commented "It was not an easy move. And the match is not over yet."

In fact, some moment later on the blackboard they could read 52 points for Mion, 37 for Giancarlo. There were still 15 points to recover, but it would have been harder and harder, Mion had quickly learned how her opponent was hitting, and in a very few time she was able to do the same. He had to think about something else. Mion pocketed easily the ball number 15, which was the only one remained, so they prepared the fifteen balls again on the table. Mion hit, with no balls pocketed, and so it was Giancarlo's turn. He quickly made seven points in a row, but the ball number 8 was impossible to direct into one of the hole. Because of an unforeseen counterblow, the white ball has finished in a corner, next to the ball number 14, and the other one was in the opposite one, covered by the ones number 10 and 13.

"It's going to be a very tricky shot. Let's see what are you doing now..." said Mion, genuinely curious. The Italian boy stood motionless for two or three minutes, before shaking his head. "So, is it really impossible, even for our great hero?" she exclaimed, triumphant.

"Likely. But there's a thing I can do. I can't bring it to the hole, but I can take it far from it." He took his cue, and he hit. Playing off the cushion, he was able to touch lightly the ball he was aiming at, and to make the white one go back to the starting point. The black ball, instead, only budged a couple of centimeters, stopping right between the other two of them. Hitting it again was nearly impossible, now.

"Hmph, I've been very lucky, I risked not to touch the other ball, it would have been a penalty... However, it's your turn, now." he said, directed at his opponent. Mion looked at the table, and she shouted: "And can you tell me how can I reach that ball, now?" The ball number 8 was completely hidden between the others, she could never reach it without touching another one before, and therefore it would have been a point for the other boy.

"It's a so-called defense shot, I guess" explained Domiro "his aim was not to score a point, but to make your next shot impossible, or at least very very hard. But the most incredible thing is to see such a self-taught boy like you."

"T-thank you..." he answered, blushing "But I only have used my mind, to think them up, and I had to make some experiments, you have seen I've missed quite a lot of shots. And after all, at home I've sometimes played a game similar to bowls, so this is helping me a bit."

"You cheater!" was Mion's answer.

"Why don't you focus on your next step, instead of harassing me?" he replied.

"You dirty..."

The match was getting extremely astounding. Mion was still leading it, but only by 2 points now, 77:75. She had to score three more points to win, but tension into the air was palpable, and it was a very close match. The Japanese girl was quickly learning the way her opponent was playing, and she was now using his same hints, and in a far better way than him, as her lesser number of mistakes showed. On the other hand, Giancarlo had to find new ideas, more and more difficult and risky, and sometimes he missed his shots, but his choices were much more original than hers, and he could find solutions Mion wasn't able to see. The others did nothing but following her, astonished.

"If they replayed a new match after this," said Domiro, amused as well "Mion-san would win for sure, Serco-san can't continue experimenting and risking so, his opponent would go on learning from how he plays until he runs out of ideas. But in this match nothing has been decided yet, and I can't really say who will win."

And finally they reached the peak. 79:79, Giancarlo's turn. He wasn't an easy shot at all, on the contrary it was probably the toughest of the whole match. Mion's defense shot had been extremely effective, the cue ball was not far from one of the short cushions, and the ball number 9 was next to the middle of the opposite one, far from the holes and well hidden behind other three balls, and all the remaining ones worked as bothering obstacles. Only touching his target properly would have been a sensational achievement. Furthermore, there were only seven balls on the table, making a good defense shot would have been extremely hard, and the girl would have had quite an easy shot. He had to pocket that damn ball with that lone hit.

He thought, and he thought, and he went on thinking. There looked not to be any solution, so he raised his eyes to the ceiling of the room, and he didn't move from there until he finally whispered: "Well, let's try, then". He got into position, trying to focus as much as possible on his target, and he aimed at one of the central holes, where no balls were present. He looked alike wanting to pocket the cue ball itself.

"Oh, why are you doing it? It would have been a pity if you surrender now..." commented Satoshi. The others didn't answer, especially Mion. She didn't know which one, but she was sure he had a plan. And in fact he hit, with as much strength as he could.

The ball hit violently the hedge of the hole, and it jumped in the air, spinning extremely fast and aiming in the right direction. Mion saw it flying in front of her eyes, shocked by that unexpected move, and she followed its trajectory for a second, until it landed on the table again, grazing the ball number nine which started to move towards the hole, while the other ones went in another direction, swept away by the impact.

The yellow and white ball was now approaching slowly the hole, rolling with an endless movement. Little by little, the distance between them was getting smaller and smaller. The others couldn't distract their attention from it, and they instinctively stuck their heads out towards the table. It would have been a miracle. The ball rolled, and rolled...

Until it stopped.

It had stopped no more than five centimeters far from the hole, standing there as the most atrocious of the jokes. The white ball was not far from there, it would have been an easy shot. Mion had won.

"Phew! What a match, congratulations to both of you!" exclaimed Keiichi, beating strongly the table with his fist several times, because of his state of excitement. Wrong choice. Its old legs didn't bear with those bumps, and one of them severed, making the whole billiard fall to the floor with an enormous rumble.

Giancarlo, Mion and Domiro quickly escaped from the table, to avoid to hurt themselves, while, after having heard the noise, a lot of people came into the room, to see what had happened.

"W-we are all fine, don't worry..." said Mion, while sitting on a chair, still slightly scared.

"Luckily we are so" replied Satoko "But now who is going to repay for it?" She looked at Keiichi "I hope your parents won't be too sad for it, stupid villain... These tables are quite expensive.".

"There's no need to do it." commented Alice, examining it "This table doesn't look broken, and the leg was simply a few screwy, in my opinion. Give me a hand, it will take only some minute to return it to its place."

Promptly, the men of the group lifted the table, while Satoko screwed it again, helped by Rika. Then, Shion went next to Keiichi.

"Are you sweating, Kei-chan?"

"Not too much, it wasn't too hard to move. I thought that table was heavier."

"But you do look tired and sweaty, you should change your clothes, if you don't want to get a flu."

"I have said I'm fine..." Keiichi turned towards her, and a shiver ran down his spine. Shion was holding a pair of red knickers.

"Had you forgotten these, hadn't you?" she smiled like an innocent angel.

"YOU MUST CATCH ME FIRST!" Like a bolt he turned behind and he started to run headlong. But a rope blocked his right foot immediately, making him fall to the floor with a thump similar to the one caused by the billiard. Keiichi knew the responsible of it. Satoko was expecting his attempt to escape, and she had prepared the necessary tricks.

"Kei-chan" Shion said "Where did you want to go? Come with us, and we will play forever... and ever... and ever... and ever..."

Alice, Shion and Satoko corded him with the rope Satoko had used before, then they started to drag him. "Onee, do you want to join us? It's going to be funny!"

"I'm sorry, but I have to stay here, Shion, there's something I need to ask to Domiro-san. See you tonight at home."

"As you please. Let's go then, mates!"

"PLEASE LEAVE MEEEEEE..." Keiichi's desperate appeal rang up uselessly in the air, while the door was closed. So, Mion looked at Domiro, and she was about to open her mouth, until she noticed they were not alone.

"Gi-chan? What are you doing here? Haven't you gone with the others?"

"Well, no, I haven't, for two reasons. First of all, seeing a naked man doesn't excite me. And second, I was curious. I don't know what you have to do here, but I don't think you'll be able to do it very well, with that twisted ankle."

"So... have you noticed it?" she answered.

"Well... yes. When you had run away from the falling table, the movement of your left leg had looked a bit unnatural to me, and the fact you had sat immediately after had been the confirm. You wanted not to strain it, didn't you?"

Mion nodded. "It's nothing serious, I'm not aching so much. I just wanted to ask him to give me a lift to the Manor, nothing important."

"Well... I am sorry to disappoint you, Mion-san, but I have not a car. I have never had it. I don't either have a driving license... I don't live far from here, so I don't usually need it."

"Oh, my, that's a real problem! Kasai has not come here yet! Where is he?" She watched the time on the clock on the wall, it was a quarter to six. "Let's make a call. Domiro-san, could you go to a public phone and dial the number of the Manor? Mom should be there, she must know where he is."

The lawyer took his jacket and he went out, while Giancarlo was staring at Mion's ankle. "We should bandage it. Do you know where I can find a medical kit, in this center?"

Mion shook her head: "I don't know. I don't come her very often, you know... We usually have our activities in Hinamizawa, and our school is usually enough for us."

"I see. Well, wait a minute, I'll ask someone to show me."

While exiting the room, he was still worried, but not about looking for a kit. _I __hope __to __bandage __her __correctly, __after __I've __found __the __gauzes. __They __had __taught __me __once, __I __haven't __done __it __for __a __long __time... _Fortunately, he hadn't to do it. While looking for an infirmary, he was able to find a nurse who was there to play mahjongg, so he brought her where Mion was. When he arrived, Domiro had already gone back to the room, so, while the pony-tailed girl's ankle was being massaged and bandaged, Giancarlo was told about what had been said during the phone.

"To make things short, Mion-san's father has been contacted, and he had to go somewhere, I don't either know where precisely, but the point is he had to ask Kasai-san to drive him there. They won't go back before late evening."

"It's a real problem." Giancarlo commented "Flavia should be out of the police station, she's on patrol until 8 PM, and I can't contact her. Should we phone Keiichi's parents? Or Rena's father?"

"I've a better idea, Gii-chan. The Prefecture is not far from here, and our dear uncle is still disappointed for not having been able to help us to find the real owners of the JOST. He won't refuse to lend me one of his dedicated cars, and here we have someone who can drive, as a matter of fact.."

"This is the strength of the Sonozaki family..."

"Yes, it is. However, there's only a little problem. The uncle won't accept to see one of his cars stopping here, at a leisure center. He's eager to save appearances, I'd say. So, we have to go there, somewhat. Shion and the other won't be back here before 9 PM, probably, so what can we do?"

"You can go there right now, if you want to" explained Domiro "I have to stay here until the closing time of the center, I can advise them where they have to go."

"Let's go then." answered the Italian boy "And Mion is not obliged to walk... You know, there is still a tandem waiting for us, outside. Wait a minute, I'll take and bring it inside, next to the door here. You'll be able to sit on it by making only a step or two, and after all this room is not far from the entrance door, nobody will complain."

Some minute later, Giancarlo was pedaling, and Mion occupying the rear seat, without moving her feet. It was already dark outside, and that tandem was not carrying a dynamo, but Okinomiya's road were well enlightened, so it was not a big problem. And it was not a cold evening like the previous ones, so it was quite pleasant to ride a bike, even if he was not used to pedal for two. They were traveling at a low speed, and this was making Mion a bit sorry for him.

"It's a pity" she shouted, to be sure he could hear her during the trip "The match has ended in a tie. You shouldn't serve your punishment." To tell the truth, it was not a complete tie. Nobody would have denied she was about to win, only the chaos generated by Keiichi had prevented her from scoring that last easy point. But she couldn't accept such a result, she hadn't really made that shot, and the other boy preferred to respect her pride.

"Nah, it's not a problem, and I'm not breaking any rule of the club. We had only decided that we had to ride this tandem, and that the winner wouldn't have pedaled. We haven't come to any agreement about the case of a draw, in the end. And there must be a penalty reserved to someone, don't you agree?"

"But you had said you don't like punishments, you preferred a prize!"

"Yes, you're right. I think it is more rewarding, rather than compelling someone to do something he doesn't like. Real life would be simpler, if it worked so, too... And moreover penalties wouldn't be completely excluded, not obtaining the winner's prize is a punishment itself, don't you agree?"

"But if I follow your same line of thought, avoiding the penalty present in our activities would become your prize, so our views are just the same!"

"Oh, about the first part of what you've said, I agree with you, but to get the prize you are talking about I might simply stay away from your club, then... But if all of you want to assign punishments, it's fine for me. It's a different point of view from mine, and trying it is very interesting. That's why I had accepted the penalty you had proposed... personally I even had thought about carrying you on my back, it would have been curious. I have seen it so many times, in movies."

Mion was behind him, and that idea strangely didn't embarrassed her. _If Kei-chan had told me it, I would have been mistaken for a traffic li__ght. But I __wonder whether he's blushing or not, after having said this..._ From there, she couldn't see his could only see his head lowering slightly, and hear him going on: "But I'm not strong enough. I'm not strong at all. We would have fallen after a hundred meters or less. Tsk, during those movies this kind of incidents never happens, had I to be the first one?"

"You should become strong and powerful, then, like Kei-chan for example... By the way, I'd really love to see how he looks, with only that underwear on."

"Oh, my, I'd like to avoid that sight, instead! I wouldn't be surprised if he has already been arrested, charged of breaching the peace. Maybe it has been Flavia who has grabbed and clapped him in jail..." he laughed, then he added "I really don't know how he can bear with you, honestly... I wouldn't be able to take his place, really."

"Are you thinking we are too mean, towards him?"

"If he always accepts this carrying that smile and enthusiasm... No, I don't think so. But we are different people, I guess." He paused for a moment, they had to turn right. Then, once reached the following straight stretch, he continued: "I wouldn't have been able to make your group so strong and happy. I wouldn't have been able to help Rika-chan, and you, and Shi-chan, and Rena-chan, and the others..." He stopped speaking again, but this time it wasn't due to a turn "I'm a bit jealous, to be honest. I'd like to be like him, sometimes. Strong, reliable, a real leader. Perhaps my family would be much happier if I was so." They had arrived to a stop sign, so his fingers reached the brake grip, which was moved back smoothly. The tandem stopped, and both of them put a foot on the road, to avoid to fall.

"You're so strange, Gi-chan. A boy owner of a cotton mill, envious?"

"You're misunderstanding me, now. Don't think we're millionaires. The Sonozakis are by far richer than the Sercos, there's no doubt about it, rather I could say we belong to the same middle class where also Kei-chan's family stays. After all, the whole mill is just something a few bigger than an artisan society. I wouldn't need to do that part-time job here, otherwise. However, I'm happy it's not a big society, and I don't want to enlarge it like great-grandpa wanted to do. I'm not interested in money that much, besides a certain amount it would be only a stressful nuisance."

They were still at that sign, now, and the boy didn't talk anymore. From behind, he looked a bit downhearted to Mion. But suddenly he turned towards her. He was not smiling, and there was a shroud of sadness inside her eyes. But his face conveyed a sense of consciousness, of awareness about himself. "Yes, probably I'm envious, and not only of him, I fear. But mother Nature has given me another task, in the end. I can't do what Kei-chan has done, I have not given his means. But I want to do what I'm allowed to do. Maybe this is not sufficient to ensure happiness to my family, and my friends, maybe I will never break the Fate, as Rika had told me once... But if I do everything I can I will be able to arrive in front of God serenely, regretting nothing. Don't you agree with me?"

"I repeat what I have told you ten seconds ago, you're strange." Giancarlo restarted pedaling, and he couldn't see her smiling. Knowing they had the same feelings in common was relieving, and she was glad to see the way he had decided to deal with them. She would have never loved him, but he could be a priceless friend. He could become her conscience.

"Gi-chan... If in the future I need some advice... Will you help me, even after you've come back to your home?"

* * *

**_Author's note: And I even wanted to write short chapters... now I understand why the others' ones were often so long, you write and write, and you still fear to have forgotten something..._**

**_However, this chapter had to be written. The concept of prize/penalty will have a very important part in the very last chapters. But don't worry, I'm not forgetting the main plot at all... This part was somehow necessary. Wait two chapters (necessary as well, the protagonist of the next one simply HAD to do something, after what happened to Rena, it would have been mindless otherwise), and you'll read soon who the protagonists will have to face in reality.  
_**


	28. A sign of matureness

**28**** – A sign of matureness**

_Hinamizawa, 27th December 1983_

Hung wash, in winter, never dries. Low temperature doesn't help you at all, and if you are careless enough to forget your clothes outside, the following morning you find them covered by a nervy film of hoarfrost, which obliges you to wait more time to put them in the drawers. This was unluckily what had been just made by Keiichi's mother, and now the boy could still see the red underwear still hung up on the wire, reminding him his last humiliation. He sighed, dejected, and he entered his house, to avoid that sight.

Because of that penalty, Christmas Day had not been a pleasant one, for his ego, but at least the others had looked enjoyed by that show. Well, it was a cold comfort. During that lunch his father, while seeing him approaching the table so undressed, had thought about a new incoming era, when boys and girls go around happily in their birthday suit, and they don't feel ashamed of that. It was a bit embarrassing, especially because Rena and her father were there too, and that speech sounded delivered by an insane mind. Luckily, after that, he was finally allowed to wear normal clothes, and the rest of the day passed in a less disquieting way.

_Yes, Rena was here with us too... _He thought. The club didn't want to let her alone, even if ten days had already passed since the aggression she had endured, and there were no clues about where the assailant had gone, and about what had become of him._ I wouldn't be surprised if he died somewhere... he really seemed a dangerous element, a lunatic. But I can't say it, and Flavia and the others do well to go on helping her._ Rena, to be honest, didn't look worried, or depressed. She was still used to smile, and to joke with her friends. But Keiichi knew it might be only a mask. In the past, when her father had a love affair with Rina, she had told nothing about it in the beginning, and she behaved as if everything was fine. Nobody would have noticed she was in such a troublesome situation, and they got aware of it only after she decided to reveal the whole story. And maybe she was doing the same right now, without their noticing. If so, they could not help her, even now, even after all what had happened. They knew very well she trusted them, but they were still caught by a malign persistent fear, which didn't seem to leave their minds.

_I wonder why that maniac hates her so much. What has she done to him? His mates didn't want to be kind with her, she only wanted to defend herself, in the end. Even if the fact she had beat them up can be seen as an exaggerated reaction, but... _He shook his head, that boy's friends weren't the problem, likely he had killed them too. So, what was his real motive? He sat on one of the chairs of the kitchen, looking her mother Aiko while preparing lunch. _We are great friends, inside our club, but there are a lot of things we don't know about each other, especially about our past. We trust each other, and I would never look for what has happened while I was not with them, but maybe there's another reason pushing him. Even if, in this case, Rena would have told us about it, she doesn't like to talk about this kind of things, but she knows it would be necessary, and none of us would blame her for anything. But... what if it is something she doesn't remember, rather? Or something she knows but she thinks it's irrelevant? Everything is possible, unluckily._

Keiichi stayed sat for quite a long period, lost in his thoughts. Maybe, without either realizing it, he was only waiting for any advice, from anyone who could give him a hand. And in that house there was only a person who would have done it. His father was an eccentric man, to be kind with him, but at least his mother was a woman much more quiet and wise, with a marked common sense and intelligence. She could give him some priceless advice. And indeed she had already noticed his son's strange behavior, but until that moment she had left him alone, she preferred to finish to arrange all the necessary for lunch, before. But now she had only to wait for everything to boil, so she had some free minute. She sat on another chair, and she asked him why was he so quiet.

"Mom, do you think that your past can go after you, if you try to forget it?"

In the beginning, Aiko got surprised by that question. Her son was used to make much more substantial questions, and that one sounded one made by a philosopher, rather than by him. If he asked so, there had to be an exact reason. "Why are you saying this, Keiichi?"

"There was something I wanted to check. Do you remember that girl?"

His mother had not to ask him what _that girl _meant. It was a subject Keiichi usually preferred to avoid, but it was one they all knew very well. He was referring to the one who had changed his life forever, in Tokyo. That was not a happy period for him, he was bored, and he was looking for something more exciting than his usual daily routine. He was not short on money, his high grades granted him an extra allowance, and so he could buy that weapon, that airsoft gun he had seen behind a shop window. _It was funny to shoot at children... No, it's not exact. It wasn't funny, it was only the least boring way to spend my free time. But I had no other choices, at least that was what I thought. _He went on so for quite a long time, and the first suspicions his parents had about his behavior hadn't stopped him. Until he met a little girl walking alone. He couldn't resist, and he started tormenting her, with his usual gun. But inadvertently he had hit her in the left eye. Her bloodstained face scared him so much that he immediately ran away, leaving her alone without help, being afraid to be recognized by her, or by someone else. He had run away, and he had gone directly to home, locking in his room and averting his eyes from his parents' glances, until he couldn't avoid them any more. One morning he asked to talk with them, and he confessed everything.

That was why they were there in Hinamizawa, now. After having brought him to the police station, talked about the incident and paid his bail, they reached the conclusion that he needed a quiet place, where he could start a new life. But, since he had left the city, he hardly knew something about what had happened in Tokyo, to the people he knew, and especially to that girl. Her parents had luckily a good medical insurance, so the Maebaras didn't pay for the cures she surely needed. But this implied also that he didn't knew how she was, and what she had suffered. And he cared about this, so he had also read books and articles about the possible consequences of being hit in the eye with an airsoft gun, finding that her life had not been in danger, but she could have had permanent damages. And he didn't know what had exactly happened to her yet. He hadn't asked for it in the previous months, those memories were still painful to evoke. But now he couldn't ignore about her anymore

"Mom" Keiichi said "I'd like to know how that little girl is now. Rena has to face her past, in this period, and now it's my turn. I'd like to see she's fine, but I neither know her name."

"Are you sure you want to meet her?" Aiko was a bit worried. Unlike Keiichi, she knew the name of the girl, but she had preferred not to tell him. It was written on the documents her husband and she had to sign, in order to pay the bail. However, neither the girl's parents had been told about the shooter's real identity, they were only told he was an underage boy who had been arrested, but whose name couldn't be revealed because of his own age, indeed. They would have met him without knowing who he was really, if he had confirmed this wish.

"Yes, I want." Keiichi showed to her that it was not a temporary caprice, he was determined to do it. But he couldn't go to Tokyo. The Syndrome was still a real menace, he couldn't leave Hinamizawa.

"Hmmm, well, she should be still in her winter break period, so why don't we invite her parents and her here?"

Aiko's proposal could be the answer to Keiichi's problems. Irie had explained him that the zone where people could get the Syndrome was the one included within a 5 kilometers radius from the Swamp, including namely the Shrine, the School, and most of the village. But his house was outside that area, it was placed in Hinamizawa's periphery, recently built on one of the Sonozakis' old lots, so whoever came in without visiting the village was safe. He already knew it, because he was worried about his father's customers: the _Maebara Mansion_, as the villagers called it due to its size, was also an art gallery containing his father's works, and sometimes it was visited by people interested in buying them. He had been relieved, being aware that they wouldn't have risked to get the disease. And that girl too, if she had gone there. It would have been enough to organize a meeting sufficiently long to make sure it became too late for a tour of the village, to make them go back directly to Tokyo.

"Mom, you're right! That's a great idea, I knew I could rely on you!" he exclaimed, smiling.

Her mother paid him back with the same smile, then she went on: "We can offer them a free visit of your father's art gallery, they will find him interesting. And, of course, we're going to pay the expenses for their trip from Tokyo to here."

"Yes, but... won't they think it's strange? An artist from a village far from them invites them, and only them, to visit his house. And what if they have already an arrangement...?"

"Hmmm... Let me think about a proper settlement..." Aiko was fond on detective stories, she would have found out something. And in fact, after some moment: "Well, we can tell them that our gallery is always available for a visit, and we'll propound more days they can choose between, they can't be engaged everyday. And about your first objection... well, you're forgetting than no more than a year and a half ago we were in Tokyo, too. We'll claim that your father had taken some photo during one of the past festivals of her school, and recently he had reviewed them, finding some of her drawings very interesting. If I well remember, they did have done something similar there, I know the school she was attending, I spent some year there, too."

"And so he's going to meet its authoress, to have more info about them and then to get some new inspiration... Yes, I like it, Mom. Thank you, it's the perfect suggestion I was searching for."

"Good. But now let's find your father, we need his help too. Nay, you'd better to go alone, otherwise my stew will become soon uneatable."

…

"Thanks for coming here, Rika-chan."

The Maebara Art Gallery was well enlightened, like the times when the critics came and admired some new work. It was ready to host the guests they had invited. The following day would have been New Year's Eve, but fortunately Kiriko's family had accepted to come. Keiichi couldn't wait to see Kiriko, which was the little girl's name, as her mother had told him. But such a young kid would have got embarrassed to talk with him, his care towards her would have seemed suspect, so he asked Rika to join him.

"Really, thank you again" he went on "I hope you're helping her to feel more at ease, I couldn't do it alone."

"It's not a so incredible favor, please don't thank me. In the end, I am neither sure to be the one more suitable to such a task." she replied, grinning and gazing at a random spot of the room "However, you are so well-dressed that she will think you want to marry her..."

"Hey, you're joking, I hope!"

"Hmmm... maybe. You know, a young and handsome man could become quickly every little girl's dream."

Keiichi blushed. It was not the first time he was mistaken for a pedophile, especially after having helped Satoko to be accepted by the community of the village; that name could have caused some problem to him, one day or another. Anyways, it was not unused to those sudden brainwaves by Rika, and he found the bravery to answer: "I can do nothing about it, I'm representing Dad's activity, here. And you were the only one I could really asked for help, inviting Satoko here would have meant bringing Satoshi and Shion, too, and Kiriko-chan would have felt terribly uneasy, surrounded by so many people."

"There are other kids in our school, what about Tomita-kun, or Otakura-kun..."

"But you were the most obvious choice, please try to understand me..."

Rika sighed, making a disconsolate gesture with her hand and saying _OK, OK..._, while she was hearing the noise of a car. Keiichi and Rika looked out of the window, and they saw them.

First, her parents entered. An ordinary couple, looking like thousand of others. Keiichi nearly ignored them, and aimed directly at who was behind them. Held in her hand by her mother, Kiriko was entering. She was taller than what Keiichi remembered, but it was not strange, nearly two years had passed, and kids grow up fast. How old could she be, then? No more than seven or eight, likely. She was still a young, short girl with black hair, not different from most of the ones he had seen during his life. But she was wearing a pair of glasses. He didn't remember them. Yes, it was the first time he saw her with a pair of glasses, she hadn't worn them the day of the incident, otherwise he couldn't have harmed her in the eye with an airsoft gun. She had started to use them after that day, therefore. Was she carrying them because of that incident? Unfortunately, it seemed so. Hers were not normal glasses. Drawn on the left lens, there was a little cat, which took up nearly all its surface. The picture itself was a cute one, colorful and joyful, fitting the very young age of who was wearing them. But, as Keiichi and Rika immediately realized, its real purpose could be nothing but to hide from the others' sight what there was behind the lens.

Keiichi's heart wrung. Her left eye was not fine at all, for sure. She had to suffer because of what had happened to her, and, if she was still carrying the signs of it, they would never have vanished, they would have come along with her for the rest of her life. Probably also her behavior had changed, after the incident. The little girl was hiding behind her mother, scared, as if she wanted not to be seen by anyone. She was an unhappy girl, desperately marked on her body, and likely on her soul. And he was the only guilty of all of that.

He swallowed. _No, I can't be scared, now. I didn't want her to be here to be scared of how she looks like._ After all, he knew there was a high chance that incident had permanent consequences. He had to face it, and he couldn't stay motionless, in that corner. He stepped forward, supported by Rika's nod, and he went towards her, friendly smiling and following the example given by his father, who had joined her parents to greet them.

"Hi, little girl. My name is Maebara Keiichi, I'm happy to meet you. What's your name?"

The girl in front of her hugged more strongly her mother, but not because she had recognized him. Likely she was used to be eyed by the others, and those glances were usually a sign of their shock and compassion. They probably used to think _Poor girl, what has happened to her?_ and they went on observing her, as if she was an unlucky beast instead of a normal human being. And this made her feel uncomfortably, like every other kid she only needed to feel alike being accepted by the others, and all that attention could only disturb her.

However, Keiichi went on smiling, and Rika too. They didn't want to make her sad, they wanted to raise her mood, in order to make Keiichi's one higher too. Slowly, she showed herself, and she answered, blushing shyly: "M-my name is Domoto Kiriko, I-i-I'm pleased to meet you here."

Kiriko was looking to the ground now, to avoid the others' eyes. Then, Rika knelt next to her, to be able to look at her face, and she proposed: "Why don't you come with us? Let's look at all those drawings, they are cute!" She closed her eyes, and she added "Nippa!~" The black-haired girl nodded, so Rika held her in her hand, and they started to visit the gallery, guided by Keiichi.

During the following two hours, they admired tons of drawings and works, and Keiichi's father was continuously asking for the little girl's opinions about them, claiming he considered them _necessary and of strategic importance_. As expected, since they didn't know a lot about art, in the beginning, Kiriko and Rika were only saying they were "strange stuff". Maebara Ichiro, hearing them, burst into a laughter, and he started to teach them about the history of his artistic vein, trying to let them share in values and principles of his works. He was enthusiast, while spelling those words, and he didn't show any sign of stopping, even if his young audience didn't seem to understand his speech, in spite of the man's effort.

"So can't you realize what this means to me? Can't you see my spirit, inside this?" he started crying, kneeling with a melodramatic move.

"They wouldn't be the first ones, I suppose" commented Keiichi "Personally neither I have understood why the critics like it. But probably it's because I don't love art as you do, Dad."

"How dare you saying this?" he shouted "You are my son, and this is my job, this is my passion, this is my life! And people from all over the World have appreciated my efforts, they like how I interact with the various cultural currents, with their tastes and their needs! Dozens and dozens of people, every year, every week, every day! They all come to see my masterpieces here, and nothing else! On this Earth there are other artists, other talented men and women, but they choose me, and they allow me to go on with my research, supporting me with their fund and buying my paintings and sculptures! Because nowadays they are looking for something new, they are looking for a new view of the world, for an unexplored ambit which can drive them towards new inebriating horizons!"

It was clear from who Keiichi had taken his oratorical skill, now. "This is modern art! In the past we obeyed to what our client wanted, we couldn't show our feelings. The buyer wanted a simple portrait, and a simple portrait he was given. The buyer wanted a giant fresco, and the painter had to spend years of his life, forgetting his own hobbies and interests, to complete it, and after he had finished he maybe had to listen to the client, who complained for a worthless reason, and who could decide not to pay the author if he wasn't satisfied. But we had no choice, starving was the alternative. Now, instead, everyone has understood that an artist can reach much higher peaks, when he's free to disclose his heart and his spirit. Every dummy you can find in the worst art school can paint the long nose of an anonymous villain, but only Van Gogh could paint those incredible Sunflowers, and I, Maebara Ichiro, I am the only one who can take the Art away from the decadence it's sinking in, only I can do-"

"I thought these drawings were strange, but he's strange too..."

Slowly and mechanically like a puppet with no charge left, Ichiro turned towards Kiriko, who had destroyed his idyll with those very few words. Nobody was understanding him, nobody was comprehending the purpose of his whole life, he was a lone man, as the old good figure of the Cursed Poet required. He knelt, covering his eyes with his arm, and he started to cry, like a baby who had been deprived of his favorite lollipop.

Rika smiled, and she explained to the other girl: "Kiri-chan, it's just because we are little. When we grow up we're loving them, and perhaps we're going to made even better drawings! Nippa!~"

_Damn __Keiichi, __I'm __going __to __pretend no less than __2000 __Yen __for __each __hour __I've __worked __as a __baby sitter here... __I'm __still __the __Maiden __of __the __Furude __Shrine! Otherwise, the next time we play some activity in the club, I'll show no mercy, and so... _Hanyuu was terrified, hearing Rika's real and cynical thoughts. But she got sincerely pleased, when she saw the other girl so happy. Kiriko had closed the right eye, as sign of joy. Rika couldn't see the other one, the cat drawn on the lens was still hiding it, but the blue-haired girl and the spirit next to her were sure that it was closed as well. It was a normal girl, even if she carried that handicap, and making her being aware of it could only help her.

Kiriko's parents looked at her. They looked extremely pleased to see her happy, probably it didn't happen very often. So, the woman nodded, turned at her husband, who asked Rika to play with her daughter, while the others would have gone elsewhere, to talk. Then, as preannounced, he asked Keiichi's father to bring them to a room where they could discuss about something they wanted to know. Ichiro drove them to the living room, where everyone sat, and, after a long moment of silence, the man spoke to Keiichi:

"Maebara-kun, can I ask you something? Are you... the one who had... well... I mean... the one who had shot her?"

Keiichi didn't answer, so Kiriko's father closed his eyes, realizing that was the truth. The boy in front of him didn't seem to find the strength to speak, so he went on:

"You know, this invitation looked so strange, I already knew something about your father, but we were still worried, we were even afraid of being swindled... Until we saw you, here. We were told the culprit was a boy around your age, and even if his name was unknown to us..."

Keiichi didn't think about what to do, in the case they had recognized him. But he quickly found it out. He stood up, with a strong sense of dignity, and then he kowtowed, blaming himself for what he had done.

"Domoto-sama, I'm sorry! I am terribly sorry for what I have done! I am ready to pay for it, I'm going to do everything you want, to refund my debt towards you!"

The Domotos looked at each other, trying to find an answer. They were still angry with him, he had destroyed their daughter's life, and theirs, too. But he had organized everything to look for their forgiveness, they had allowed her daughter to have a very pleasant day, and he really looked regretful. The man decided to wait for a couple of minutes. He wanted to check if the boy would have stood up quickly, or if he would have stayed in that position, showing how big his remorse was. And, as a matter of fact, Keiichi didn't move. He looked alike he wouldn't have moved from there as long as necessary, till someone answered to his words, and the man appreciated this. So he started to speak:

"Maebara-kun, we are still upset, for what has happened, you know. After the... the incident, our daughter had to go through a long sequence of surgical interventions, and she has not healed completely. She will _never_ heal completely. She still suffers from a permanent tear to his iris, a glaucoma, and an epiretinal membrane. I've learned these words by heart, by this time, I've read them so many times... Moreover, sometimes her left eye becomes suddenly bloody-red, probably because some of the capillaries breaks, and this is not a pleasant sight, that's the reason of those glasses. She will always be nearly blind in her left eye, and with those disturbs she will never be considered a normal girl by her friends, anymore. But she is still our daughter, and we love them. I know you are sincerely sorry, but... we can't forgive you light-heartedly, as if nothing has happened. Please understand us, concede us some time, at least."

Keiichi raised his head, nodding. And his father added: "Domoto-san, I comprehend you, and your sorrow. We don't want to force you, obviously. But my family would really like to make peace with yours. This will never rub out what has happened, but it will help all of us to have a more serene life. Please take all the time you need to think about it, this house will be always open for you and your family."

"I see..." Domoto answer, before calling her daughter, and saying: "Thank you very much for your invitation. It has been an useful visit, we've really appreciated your efforts. Really, I'm sincere."

He held Kiriko in his hand, and he exited followed by his wife, looking behind at their hosts with still a shroud of sadness and insecurity. But before disappearing behind the door, the little girl looked at Keiichi, hailing with her free hand, and she smiled, while exclaiming: "Bye, Onii-chan!".

Keiichi raised his hand to pay back her greeting, and then he heard the noise of their leaving car. Then he turned towards his mother: "Did you already know they would have understood, didn't you, Mom?" She liked detective stories, and she had also written some novel. There was no chance she had thought about a plan unmasked so easily.

In fact, she nodded: "As you can easily imagine, there are no photos of her old drawings in this house, and it would have been enough for her parents to ask for them, and they would have guessed the truth. Moreover, this is a plan too improvised and ragged, everyone would have had some suspicion. And they would have found the truth only by looking at how you behaved towards Kiriko-chan. I know you very well, you are my son after all."

"So you wanted them to realize who I was."

"Yes, that's why I had asked you if you were sure to make this step. If you want to make peace with them, guided by your conscience, you can't hide your sin. They can't forgive you, if they don't know what they have to forgive you for. At least tell it to her parents for now, that girl is still too little."

"I see... but what are they going to do, now? They are going to pardon me, in your opinion, or rather..."

"I don't know, Keiichi. This is not a fantasy story or a TV show, in real life people hardly forgive others immediately. It will take some time for them to take a choice, and I can't say how much. But I can say something: maybe they were angry because of what you had done _in the past_, but they weren't so because of what you have done _today. _They are aware you are regretful, and they have appreciated this attempt by you. Perhaps they could still decide not to see you anymore, but we have helped them to go forward, to go over that horrible experience. We have helped them, no matter the decision they will take."

"Keiichi doesn't have to feel sorrowful for anything" added Rika, smiling "He has done what he had to do, he has done what he could to change his destiny, and he must be happy for this. Moreover, I am sure everything will end in the best way possible, Kiri-chan is a cute cute cute girl, now. Nippa!~"

Keiichi smiled in turn, relieved. His heart was a bit lighter, now. With those feelings, then, he put a jacket, and he went out of the Mansion, followed by Rika. It was late, and he had to accompany her at home.

* * *

**Coming up= TIPS: Forgotten Worlds IV**

**Chapter 30, Miko's Judgment ~ The girl who played with people's shapes (let's see who is able to find out from where I am taking this title)  
**


	29. TIP: Forgotten Worlds IV

**TIP: Forgotten Worlds IV **

Puff, pant...

Let's stop here. I can't run anymore, my lungs ache, and my heart pulses as if it's about to explode.

Phew, I must be safe, now. I am far enough from her, and nobody can't have seen me.

Why had she to look at me?

I wanted to have some fun, nothing more. I only wanted to have a pleasant afternoon. I wouldn't have caused her any harm, if she did what she was supposed to do. Bur she has ruined everything. She could turn her back, and protect her face. And instead she has turned at me. What she wanted to do? To see who I was? To fight me? There was nothing she could do to fight me, she had to run away, that's the point. It's... It's her fault, if I hit her in the eye. Kids are stupid, especially girls.

But now? I can't stop here, I have to go somewhere. Where could I shelter? Home? It's a chance, but I don't like it very much. Mom and Dad should be there, and a sudden arrival could make them suspicious. I am not feeling like talking to them about my day. I could lie about it, but would they trust me? Someone has told them there is something wrong about me, and I might get myself into trouble, if I'm not convincing. So, what could be an alternative? Staying under a bridge for a while, like a beggar? Playing in an arcade until the sunset? No, let's use a more natural attitude. First of all, let's reach the river, I have to get rid of this gun. And then, let's have a walk, as if nothing has happened. Boredom is the least of my problems, now.

But this sensation is oppressive. Is it my sense of guilt? No, it isn't. I'm feeling an uncontrollable fear flowing into my veins. I don't want to be arrested. I don't mind what I've done, but I don't want the others to be aware of it. What would they think about me, otherwise? I'd lose their esteem, I'd lose my name. I wouldn't be considered a brilliant boy anymore, I would be seen only like a vandal. They would stop to love me. My teachers, my relatives, my parents. I'd lose everything, I'd lose everyone. I can't accept it.

My head is full of unhappy thoughts. I've got rid of my weapon, but I can't get rid of my doubts and regrets. They are hammering me, and for sure they won't give me a moment of peace. But why? I didn't want to harm anybody. I only wanted to have some pleasant moment, just not to be bored. What should I do, otherwise? I have no real hobbies, I have no real friends, here. They all hate me, because of my high grades. Having fun alone was not one of the possibilities I had. It was the only one.

But now I have nobody I can really trust. Maybe my parents? But this is something serious, they can't give me a satisfactory help. And having no friends means that I have to face this matter alone. And that, potentially, everyone is my enemy. Everyone can be my condemn, if I am not careful.

What will I have to do, in the next days? Being careful, hinting nothing about this fact. We are far from school, and here in Tokyo there are major crimes to talk about. If I don't say anything about it, nobody will do. But if someone does, instead? It would mean that he knows something about my involvement, likely. I am alone, and so I can't lower my guard, for no reason.

Whose is that shadow? Who is that woman following me? Because she does follow me, this is a secondary road, and there are not shops here, nor houses. There is only a never-ending wall on the left, and a scarp next the river on the right. Why is she keeping a look on me? Has she seen me while I was throwing the gun? Or, even worse, while I was shooting that girl? Damn middle-aged lady, have you nothing better to do than tormenting me? Have a cup of coffee with your friends, instead of losing time with me.

She had nothing to do, was this what I was saying? But this could be her job, indeed. She is not wearing a uniform, but she could be a plain-clothes officer. Maybe she is on patrol, or maybe today is her day off, and her sense of duty forces her not to leave me. Had you really to obey to such rules, to such ideals? Get out of my way, and leave me live.

But shouldn't she declare her identity, in this case? He can't put me under arrest, if she doesn't reveal she's a policewoman. But does it really works so, or is this just my hope? I don't know, only Mom does likely, but I can't afford to discover it now. There must be a way to leave her behind without arousing suspicions. Yes, that left turn is exactly what I need. Let's reach it, and then let's run as fast as we can.

No, I can't, instead. If I run in that direction, I will go towards the place I've shot her. There are surely plenty of people there, arrived to give a look at what has happened to that little dull, and to call for an ambulance. Everyone will see me, there's no chance I can go through it unnoticed. They will realize I'm anxious, and scared, and nervous, and they will get the obvious conclusions. No, I must think about a diversion. I reach the turn, I go to the left, and I stop.

Fortunately I am not bad in jumping. Behind this turn there is a flight of steps, so the wall on the left becomes gradually lower, and I am able to reach its top with no great effort. Can she do the same? It's possible, or rather probable, or rather certain. But if she can't see me she will neither think to do that. How can I hide myself, here? This structure is large enough to stand and even walk on it easily, but there isn't any kind of refuge. If she sees me, I have fallen into a mousetrap.

No, there is another way to get away with it. There's a large pole, standing on the inside of the turn, it's my only chance. If I move quickly enough while she turns, behind it I will be always hidden from her, she won't see me before and after the turn itself. I hear her steps, let's stop breathing. This painting is making me feel a beast escaping from its hunter, and I don't blame myself for thinking to be so, it's the truth, simply.

Here she is. She has turned left, and she has stopped. I am still on the top of the wall, squat, so I can see her from behind the pole, we are no more than two or three meters far. She is surprised not to see me any more, and she doesn't stop looking the road, motionless. She was really searching for me, then, but I have been sly, slier than her. She can only go back, now, and I have only to wait for a little while, before doing the same.

Yes, I was right. She has renounced to get me, visibly. Slowly, she has started turning behind her, and her head is following the movement of her body. But, in order to do so, she is turning also towards the pole. Then she will see it, and only now I realize I am still larger than the pole, I can't hide myself completely, so this means...

Run, Keiichi, run. This wall is large enough, I can use the top of it as if it's a narrow road, and I can even run on it. Just be careful. Two meters below me, that woman, namely, that officer is chasing me, with a whistle in her mouth. I can't go back, I can only run. After all, I know this zone, and she can't follow me forever. In two or three hundred meters, the road she's running along will stop, while the wall will continue, overlooking directly the river. I can still run, moving towards my freedom.

I was right, the officer had to stop, and now I am still running. But how can I go back home, now? This wall ends at a crossroad, but the policemen know it as well. She must have informed her colleagues, and maybe they are already waiting for me. But I can't stand here, the wall itself is too high in this point, and there is a sort of quarry between the river and it, at least five meters large. I wouldn't be able to reach the water, if I decided to dive.

I must be calm. That officer hadn't a car, she can't have advised the others immediately. She was obliged to reach the nearest public phone, or her car, to do it. There is some time left for me, I must be faster than them.

Run, Keiichi, run.

Suddenly, I perceive that my foot is not touching the top of the ground, anymore. It has slipped, somehow. Maybe a puddle of water, we are not next to a river, and this place is wet. Or maybe I was running too fast, I couldn't control my body, and my foot had slipped off the border of this narrow path.

I'm falling in front of me. I see the top of wall coming towards me. I'm going to bang my head against it. There's no way I can stop myself, it will be a tremendous blow... I'm going to split my head open. The path which had seemed my salvation is condemning me.

In front of me, I'm seeing my life, now. My parents, my childhood, my first friends. My school, my teachers, my high grades. My boredom, my gun, my strange afternoons. And then that girl, and her blood.

Time seems to have been stopped, now, or at least it's going extremely slowly. I can see my sins, I can see my regrets, I can see my desperation. I can see what I really needed.

Now, all these images are disappearing. In front of me, I see only a little girl. She's not the one I have shot, she has long blue hair, instead. She looks at me with an air of deep sadness. She's sorry for me.

"So this time you're not coming to Hinamizawa, Keiichi? This will be a very sad world."

I can't think about who she is, and what she's talking about. The wall is too near to my head.

A mangling thump reaches my ears, and this is the last noise I can hear.


	30. Miko's Judgment

**30 - Miko's Judgment ~ The girl who played with people's shapes**

_Hinamizawa, 2nd January 1984_

Living in her home was boring, fundamentally.

This is what Rika thought, while she was waking up. Satoko had been living with her brother since he had come back home, and of course there was no chance for her to live into her same house again. Of course, Rika's house was a very small one, but having two tenants inside would have hardly caused any problem of overcrowding. Especially if those two tenants were little girls. It would have been much more pleasant to have someone next to her, in the moments she sheltered under her kotatsu to shield herself from coldness, she would have had someone to play with. After all, Satoko's energy engaged her in everything, when she was in a good mood.

Whatever. That day was not a frosty one, there wasn't much hoarfrost on the trees around her house, as she noticed by opening the window. Rika'd have loved all the winters to be so, she hated low temperatures, and she was pleased by that temperate weather, she wanted to take advantage of the appearing sun. So, she got quickly dressed and she had breakfast. And then, after placing her futon into the built-in cupboard, she went out, to give a look at the Shrine and to make sure everything looked fine as usual, and she went out, followed as usual by Hanyuu.

As expected, nobody had gone to the Shrine yet. During early mornings, and especially in wintry ones, the naked trees Rika knew very well were usually the only creatures attending the building. An absolute silence reigned in the zone, the cold season didn't allow either birds to song. That place was often the Kingdom of Ice, in that period, but fortunately hoarfrost hadn't occupied the roof of the building and the surrounding trees, that morning. That was good, thought Rika, more visitors would have come, and the more people, the more donations. They were quite important for her, after all, they were a substantial mean of livelihood: Irie couldn't give her as much money as in past, after the Yamainu had been defeated he didn't avail of the same resources.

"Well, it's not a real problem" Rika said, while sweeping the open space in front of the temple "I'm going to live in the same way my ancestors did, in the past. A poor but dignified existence."

"But some extra money would have suited us very much. In the end, life is full of unforeseen events, and of unexpected expenses as well."

Rika looked at the roof. It needed some repair work, indeed. But she hadn't the required money to start it, and Hinamizawa was a little community, there were no many people who could afford that expense. There was only a family who could do it, but she wouldn't ask them for it. She was not stubborn like Mion, but she carried her own pride too, as the only living member of the Furude family.

"It would be a problem if the whole Shrine is destroyed, and we need to rebuild him. This place is full of legends about goddesses coming from Heaven and attacking the Shrine with stones and mighty swords, and there are stories which talk about demons who assist the miko of the temple, and about witches, ghosts, magicians of every sort, vampires living in a far Mansion who avail of a scarlet red mist, and..."

"Your fantasy is flying too high now, Hanyuu. I know the miko's role has always been to protect her little world, but even only imagining that such incidents can really happen is mere delirium. We have already to think about real matters, and the donations we are usually given will be enough. But if that's the case, I'll protect those precious coins and kill the felons who try to steal them despite my authority, and I'll show no mercy towards their cursed souls!" she menaced, grasping her broom as if it was a scythe.

"Hauu! But are you listening to me, when I talk? I know you are strong, but incidents are always behind the corner, and we could need-"

"The whole village would help me, in this case. Moreover, Hanyuu, I am here to pray Oyashiro-sama, namely to pray you. My role here is to invoke your intervention, to make sure you will protect us, to avoid this sort of problems, don't you agree?"

"But I can't do that, you know it!"

"Then I'm a cheater and a swindler, since I ask for respect towards a useless god." she said smiling, putting away her broom.

"Hauuuu! You're evil! You're a Demon! Why do you always enjoy teasing me?"

Rika didn't answer, amused by her embarrass, so she went to the Saiguden.

"Rika, why don't you say anything? I hate whe-"

"Psst, Hanyuu, don't speak. Look over there, the door of the Saiguden has been opened."

The ghost goddess watched the scene, and she immediately realized Rika was right. One of the doorway was slightly shifted towards right, and there was now a little cleft between the two of them. Somebody had given a look from there, or, even worse, he had entered.

"I... I though we would have not run into this kind of problems, anymore." cried out Hanyuu.

"Hmmm... there seems to be nobody inside, I can't see any torch, or any movement." Rika explained, while spying from the cleft. "However, let's enter, I want to check if they have stolen something." She opened completely the door, and she took a torch hung next to the entrance. The Saiguden was an old building, there were no lamps to turn on inside.

"Is there anybody here?" she shouted. Silence was the answer.

"They must have been here during the night, I can't see any other explanation." commented Hanyuu. "Everything looks to be still here, so some curious man must have wished to see the inside of the Saiguden. Some intruder, I suppose."

"Please don't call me _intruder. _This is my home, as much as it's yours, at least."

Rika and Hanyuu quickly turned at the direction the voice came from. Sat on the pedestal of the giant statue of Oyashiro-sama, a miko was watching them, serious. Long blue hair, very similar to Rika's one, only a bit lighter. Apart of that, she looked her exact clone.

"Who... who are you?" she said astonished, coming near to her and leaning the torch on the floor. The dark blue-haired girl started to think she was one of the Rikas coming from the previous worlds, killed by Takano in another Hinamizawa. But she was carrying no wounds on her womb, and in fact Hanyuu disproved her hypothesis, calling that girl by her name.

"Ouka, I didn't think I could ever see you here! I am so happy to see you again!"

_Ouka? _Rika thought, opening her eyes wide. She was Hanyuu's daughter, when she was alive. She had been... the one who had killed her mother, in the past.

In that time, a lot people in the village hated Hanyuu, because of her horns, which made the others claim she was only a monster, or rather a demon. And they weren't completely wrong, because she was really a demon. She had to move with her clan to Onigafuchi, as they named Hinamizawa then, and once there she had got married with the priest's son, who had fallen in love with her. But the humans there were afraid of the demons, and the numerous marriages between the two races made impossible to state who belonged to a group, and who to the other. Hanyuu, as their chief, became the symbol of this chaos, and they started to act extremely aggressively towards her. So, in order to give a better future to her family and her village, she had asked Ouka to kill her. It was the first Watanagashi, the most authentic one, because it was an attempt to wash away everybody's sins. However, before killing her with her ceremonial sword, Ouka had promised to her mother that she would have built a world where no sacrifices were required to save Hinamizawa. That was why she taught the villagers to fear Oyashiro, and why all those scary legends and stories had been created. The other inhabitants were too sure that she was a cruel monster to be convinced of the opposite, that name would have never gone away. So she claimed that Hanyuu was a demon, indeed, but also that all of them were so, by that time, because a demon doesn't rise in a normal human village with no reason, and then they couldn't hate a fellow of theirs. And they wouldn't have menaced Hanyuu's descendants, once they had been told Oyashiro was protecting the Onigafuchi thanks to them, and once they were afraid to be cursed, if they committed mischievous actions.

Yes, this explained why they were so similar, she was an ancestor of her too. But how was she able to come here? And why? And, most of all, why was she so serious, in spite of seeing her mother after all this time?

"Mother..." Ouka whispered, showing no feelings "Mother..."

"Yes, please tell me, what do you want to say?"

"Mother... Why have you betrayed me?"

Hanyuu froze, hearing those words. _Be-betrayed? When? _She really couldn't see how she could have done such a betrayal.

"You don't understand, do you, Mother? So, do you remember what I've told you, in that last day?"

"That you would have created a world where sacrifices were unnecessary. Yes, I know that."

"So, why did want to die again, last summer?"

Instinctively, Hanyuu averted her eyes from Ouka's ones. She had a point. When Takano aimed at Mion, in the forest, she wanted to protect her, and she put her body between the two of them, knowing she was likely going to die. It was another sacrifice, not different from the first one. But she also knew she had done the right thing. Had she to let her friend die? She raised her head and she answered:

"So you have seen us. And then you know the whole story. Could I do something different, in your opinion, Ouka?"

"You should have settled a better plan, to avoid that useless final challenge. Why had you to go to Takano, while she was still armed? You could force her to shoot that last bullet somehow, and you would have been to speak to her how much you wanted. But this is not the point."

"I am not good at arranging good strategies, and I had to act quickly that day. But please go on, what are you talking about, then?"

"You were not the only one who wanted to commit this sacrilege. You have not been the one who has denied what I've done." Ouka lowered her eyes, trembling, then she continued: "After your death, I've made everything I could to build a better village. But I immediately had understood that Onigafuchi would have never been a paradise, a place where everyone is happy. This view is in contrast with the human nature, and I can't change it. And neither you. Please answer me, during all this time were you trying to build a village where everyone is happy, like mindless dunces?"

"We wanted a world where everybody could survive, and decide what to do, free from the Syndrome, and from their fears."

Ouka didn't expect an answer from Rika, and she eyed her with a disquieting glance. Then she replied: "And do you really think that their hearts won't be occupied from new fears, from a new anguish, after your brilliant intervention? Humans always fear something, and this is not necessarily a bad thing. A baby who is not afraid of the darkness will wake up in the middle of the night and he'll run joyfully through the whole house, until he bumps the head on a wall. They _need _fears, don't you see it?"

"You are a human too, Ouka, I've always told you not to forget it. Don't talk about them as if they were different from you. And, moreover, they may need it, perhaps, but surely not beyond a certain limit. Otherwise, they become obsessed by it, and they can't do nothing else than thinking about it, motionless and at the mercy of what happens around them."

"And do you know exactly where this limit is, Mother?"

"It depends on the person we are talking about. Each individual carries a different limit. Someone can't afford either a particle of stress, someone else instead can become even stronger thanks to it."

"But you can't say where this limit is for each person, however. You don't know deeply every man and woman in this world, and likely neither the ones in Hinamizawa."

"Why don't you shut up and get to the point?" Rika exclaimed, getting nervous. Ouka seemed really aggressive and angry towards them. No, _angry _wasn't the right word. She rather looked _disgusted._

"Do you want to know, _Rika-chama_?" she answered, scornful "We had tried to use pacific method, to make the others accept Mother's presence, but it was useless, and they had driven her to desperation, and to death. Then, there were only two alternatives, to change their mind: using violence, or using fear. I tried to combine them."

"Have you killed the same villagers you claimed to protect, then?" Rika shouted.

"No, I didn't. I would have seen it as a sacrifice, and I've told you they were a taboo, for me. So I resorted to something else. I wanted nobody to join the village, and nobody to leave it, because I wished that what had happened to my mother and my family stayed secret, unknown to anyone outside the village, and that gradually it got forgotten. I wanted that the family they hated the most became the family they loved the most. Have you understood what I've done, now?"

Rika hadn't, but Hanyuu had. She stepped forward, and she answered bitterly "You've created the Hinamizawa Syndrome, haven't you?"

Ouka nodded, and Hanyuu explained: "When I was alive, the disease didn't exist yet. The only possible conclusion was that it had appeared later, but I couldn't image its real origins. Rika, you know, the inhabitants of the village wouldn't have tried to kill me, if I had been the Queen Carrier. Don't you remember? They are all kind with you, as they were with your mother, and your grandmother. It's due to the fact they unconsciously know they owe you their life. My case, instead, had been different. They hated me, they couldn't stand seeing me, and my horns. They hadn't to thank me for anything, that was why they were so angry towards me."

Rika already knew the story of Hanyuu's life, but she had never thought about this detail. Even if she was her ancestor, she wasn't the Queen Carrier. She would have spent a much better life, otherwise. The dark blue-haired girl, then, approached her friend's shoulder, and she leaned a hand on it, to make her feel her understanding. Then, she turned at Ouka. Rika was not that surprised she was able to produce from nothing such a terrible plague, she was Oyashiro's daughter, and a half-demon, after all. Then she spoke, angrily: "So, have you arranged such a complicated barrier to "protect" the village? The complex disease classified in five levels, the strange protein inside Mion's blood..."

"Can you trust me if I tell you it worked much more simply, in the past? This Syndrome has been generated by me, that's true, but it has autonomously developed some characteristic I neither had thought about. I suppose it's like having a baby: you give him the basic instructions, you teach him how to speak, how to walk, but there is always something you can't control, and when he grows he starts to do things independently. Maybe there has been a rational cause which has brought the disease to be like it is now, but personally I don't know which one."

Ouka continued: "However, I was satisfied of my handiwork. I had been able to convince them that leaving the village would have been their condemn to death. It had been quite easy, people in the past hardly left their birth-town, and they didn't know what happened if they did that. And the power of our family, in the following years, increased greatly, so I could show what would have happened to them, if they had disobeyed to me. You can still see all these implements here, after all. Moreover, they were extremely superstitious... The forest around Onigafuchi was told to be full of monsters and evil spirits, and I took advantage of this tales. I played with their souls, and likely with your horns too, Mother, I used your past shapes to scare them, to be sure they would have listened to me. And I was able to raise Hinamizawa's Spirit. My village wasn't a perfect world, I never pretended it to be so, but all its villagers worked together, they fought together. It was the best a woman can do onto this cursed world. And I was proud of it, until some year ago."

"What happened, then?"

"The Dam War. Hinamizawa stopped to be an isolated village, like it had been in the past. It was a group of houses included in a bigger country, which didn't want to claim they didn't exist, anymore. They decided to study the territory, and to build the Dam there. They had broken the barrier I had realized, they had forced Hinamizawa to have contacts with the rest of the world. And its result showed up immediately. Desire of money, revenge, old soothed hate... my villagers started to fight against each other, at once. The Sonozakis against the Houjous... The winner of this battle didn't matter to me, I had got furious because blood had begun to flow again. In the past they feared Oyashiro because they feared me. But now too much time had passed, they didn't fear Oyashiro's revenge, and they took care only of their personal interests. Even if I had to say I got so desperately sorrowful, when I started to see all those destroyed Hinamizawa."

"You were looking at us, when we were traveling from a world to another, then?"

Ouka nodded. "Yes. And do you want to know why I didn't help you, am I right? Think about it. My Mother had managed in reaching your world only after there had been a little miracle: the first born of the Furude Family had been a female for seven consecutive generations. To allow me to join you, instead, this consuetude had to continue for further seven generations, starting from your future sons' one."

"And so on for your descendants?"

"No. All the magical energy we owned has been entirely consumed in the moment I hit my mother with my ceremonial blade, so my descendants hadn't any kind of mystical resources, and they can't go back. From that day I gave up using magic, excepting for the last grain of mana which I used to create and handle the Syndrome. And even now, Mother and I are like ghosts who can only recur to the spells we could use before that day, while my sons were no more than normal human beings, just like you. You became special only thanks to an external help."

"Hanyuu and Bernkastel..."

"Indeed. But let's go back to the point. I wanted to help you, sincerely, but I couldn't. Until this last world. Where I've seen things worse than Death itself."

"And here you're referring to my attempt to protect the others." commented Hanyuu. "I've already told you that I had accepted this. I only wanted to give the others a chance to live happily."

"In any case, they won't."

"Why are you claiming that?"

"Because it's the truth, and because they are like you. In that cave, when the Yamainu had got you, first Shion takes a Kalashnikov to gain some time for you, then you, Rika, go up from the cave towards Okonogi, only to save her; afterwards it's Mion's turn, who has stood in front of Takano's gun, and finally Mother... You offered your life to save the others' ones, but this was not what I wanted. You weren't _risking _to die, you were _sure _to die. You all were new sacrifices. Every thing I had done in my whole life had become useless, nothing had changed in the end."

"I didn't want to die, that day." replied Rika "I was hoping for a miracle."

"Tsk, it's just the same. Miracle or not, you were sacrificing yourself. But I should thank you. Thanks to your so-called _miracle,_ I was able to be here."

"Shall I ask you why?"

"If you want so." Ouka answered sarcastically. It was really her ancestor, Rika resembled her much more than Hanyuu. "Do you already know about the balance of Evil and Good in the universe? If a good miracle becomes truth, so a bad one has to happen as well."

"I don't understand."

"It's a real pity, you should study deeper the history and the traditions of your own village. However, I only wanted to show you the irony of destiny. Thanks to a miracle, you were able to save Hinamizawa, for now. But, thanks to a miracle of the opposite nature of yours, I was able to join you here."

Rika started to be in a cold sweat. Ouka was claiming she was next to them thanks to a miracle which was supposed to bring bad news. The ancestor in front of her was showing no feelings now, while she was speaking. She was exactly like Oyashiro's statue behind her. Calm and motionless, but terrifying and menacing.

Ouka went on: "I thought for a lot of time about your behavior, really. A time equivalent to hundreds of centuries onto this world, but don't be surprised, time itself has not the same value for me and you, as you can guess. I thought, and the possible conclusion was only one. I couldn't blame you for what you had done. If a single person does something wrong, you can punish him. But if a whole group does it, you must look for the real reason who pushes them, otherwise someone else will repeat their same mistakes after a few time."

"And the reason is..."

"Hinamizawa itself. The same Spirit I've instilled in your hearts, the same community you belong to, these are the causes of these disasters."

"They are not disasters!" shouted Hanyuu "Don't dare labeling them so! On the contrary they are the purest examples of-"

"Please shut your mouth, Mother.", replied Ouka, incredibly furious. She couldn't accept that someone defended what she had tried to get rid of, during her whole life, even if that _someone_ was the woman she had cared the most in her life. Then she went on: "I don't deny I've committed some mistake too, while I was creating the new Onigafuchi. Perhaps I should have chosen another path. Fighting all together is a marvelous action, indeed, but the consequent step of this thinking process is sacrificing himself for the other villagers' sake, and I can't accept this. Maybe it had been my fault, but I'm here to remedy."

"So, what do you want to do?"

Ouka smiled, slightly and terrifyingly. Rika stepped backward, realizing that, in spite of all the tales she had told about, if there was a single Demon in all the history of the village, it was just in front of them, now.

"What can I do? I can do only a thing. _Erasing Hinamizawa..."_

Rika was sure her heart had stopped pulsing, in that moment. Her body didn't answer to any of her desires, her will had been annihilated by that ghost's gaze. Looking pantingly at her arms, she gasped, realizing they had become white as sheets. But she had to react. Swallowing, she took back the control of her mind and body, and she whispered:

"So... you were the puppeteer who was manipulating Nabiha..."

"Not exactly." she answered, going on grinning "If so, I would have already lost my war. No, I had... a friendly partnership with another man, who has guided Nabiha towards that unlucky undertaking."

"And is this joyful brigand the one who wants to kill Rena? Have you altered his mind, too?"

"I don't alter the others' nature. I don't have such a power. I am not an omnipotent goddess, as neither Mother is. When I was alive, I could only look inside their hearts, and if they suit my will and my feelings I can make their hidden desires more explicit, and I make these people aware of them. However, I'm aware there is such a stalker around you, but I don't know him, I've never met him. It's true that his unforeseen presence intrigues me, and it can lead to interesting situations, but his behavior doesn't depend on me. You know, things often go in an unexpected way, exactly like the Syndrome did. And furthermore I didn't want to kill her, in the beginning. Because my first purpose was not to kill you. The village was the problem, in my view, not the villagers. You would have gone away, elsewhere, far from this horrible place... But you have resisted, stubborn and fierce, and I understood something. You and Hinamizawa are one, I've made you so, in the end. _I can't destroy it without getting rid of you..._"

"You... You are going to kill all of us! Two thousand people, your own community, how can you even think about such a monstrosity!"

"You have chosen not to leave it, so face the consequences of it. And you would be destined to die, anyways. When you have decided to throw away your life, in your past, you have shown me it has no value, for you. I'm only sparing your descendants from a miserable existence, full of these malign ideals."

"And you are going to kill us, for this! How can your soul stand such a crime?"

"You were not doing such a different act, in the past. You were refusing a life given by someone else. Your life doesn't belong to you, in the end, it's rather a gift made by someone else. Or are you pretending you have willingly decided to be born, some year ago?"

"So, have you gone here to satisfy your anger towards me, and Hanyuu, and the others? Have you gone here simply to blow off steam on us, to announce the end of Hinamizawa? You are giving me quite an advantage, thank you very much!"

"Oh, no, I am not here only to show myself in this way." Rika hadn't either noticed it, but Ouka was only some centimeter far from her, now.

"Rika!" screamed Hanyuu, foreseeing her daughter's intentions "Run, now!"

"It's too late, Mother!" Ouka stuck an arm out, and it entered inside Rika's chest, through her skin and flesh, and meeting no apparent resistance. While still grinning, she was aiming at her heart. The dark-blue haired girl clearly perceived the other's cold hand while she was handling it, as if it was a ball, as if she was placing something inside it. She hadn't time to react, and a second later Ouka was again far from her, after having finished her job.

"Ouka, what have you done?" asked Hanyuu, presaging it was nothing good.

"Oh, only a little precaution. Do you know what happens when the Queen Carrier dies, don't you? Everybody suffers the final symptoms of the disease, and they can't avoid a painful death. Well, now even the opposite can happen."

"You are saying... that if anyone in the village dies, I am going to die too?" Rika blamed herself for not having been not smart enough to understand she was planning something special. She couldn't have gone and seen her without a purpose.

"Under certain conditions, but yes, you're right."

"And what are these _certain conditions?_"

"Rika, I do believe that the village you're living in is cursed, and it can reach neither a serene life, so I'm going to do everything in my power, to free you from it, even if you don't understand how pitiful are your existences, for now. But I'm giving you a chance." Her absence of feelings from her eyes was now total. She looked really like a cruel goddess. "I'm going away now, there's nothing we have to chat about, now. Just remember this: _If anyone, among Hinamizawa's villagers, decides to throw his own life away for you or anyone else in the village, you'll immediately die, and Hinamizawa itself will succumb because of the Syndrome. _So, if you want to defeat me, fight in a way which doesn't require anyone's life, and I'll be happy to admit my loss, if it arrives._"_

"Do you like to be evil, don't you, Ouka?" Rika gnashed her teeth.

"That's the way I was used to behave in the past. The only possible way to walk. That's how I faced my problems, to try give a better future to me and the others. But if I can't provide it, at least I can spare you from further sorrows. I'm sorry, but I'll make sure you won't see the next Watanagashi. I'll avoid to cause you useless miseries, as much as possible."

"You don't know how much I'm hating these last words. Being killed for such a foolishness is already a painful death itself."

Ouka looked at her coldly, now: "Think what you please about me, it won't change your situation. There's nothing personal, I'm only trying to avoid a sorrowful future for my village."

"Avoiding us a sorrowful future doesn't mean forbidding us to have one."

The ghost in front of her didn't reply. She was pale, looking incredibly tired. Without saying a word, she limited herself to vanish. As soon as they were alone, Hanyuu rushed towards Rika, and she looked for what her daughter had done to her. It took only a couple of moments for her to get it: "A... a spiritual seal..."

"And what is it, Hanyuu? I have never heard anything about this."

"It's a seal which is activated and broken if the state of your soul changes in a predetermined way. Please give me a minute, I will explain it to you, as clearly as I can." Hanyuu stopped speaking, and she closed her eyes. Inside her mind, she was trying to remember as much as she could about it, to gather all the necessary info, be understandable and help finally her descendant. A lot of time had to be passed since the last time she had heard about it.

"Rika" she finally spoke " Every thing which happens into this village usually changes the life of who's involved in it, and it changes his mood. This has some influence on his state of mind, and if the event is sufficiently important also his soul gets some backlash, good or bad according to the genre of the event itself."

"I understand, Hanyuu. For example, if someone runs over your mother with his car, a strong feeling of revenge can rise from your heart. While, if you are a chain-smoker and you get pregnant, you can decide to stop smoking, to protect your baby's health, full of love and happiness."

"Exactly. This is true in each situation, and you can easily guess its effect are even greater when we talk about life and death. If someone in the village dies, there are backlashes on your spirit, phenomenons that your will can't control, but that can be analyzed by this seal. But these repercussions change also according to the kind of death he had to endure. Let's make another example, it won't be hard to understand: think about your club. If one of your friends commits suicide, for any reason, you feel understandably lost; if instead he's murdered by a killer you get angry, and try to find out who's the guilty. And so on."

Rika listened carefully. She would have found some further details in some book, but Hanyuu's info sounded to be absolutely satisfying. However, she didn't understand why her ancestor had to make such sinister examples. Probably it was because this story reminded her a sad past.

"This is how the seal is able to work" she continued "If someone decided to give his life for us, your soul would react in a certain way, and the seal would perceive the change it was waiting for, unlocking itself and releasing a giant quantity of energy, and... Hauu, you should know the result." Hanyuu looked at the pedestal of the statue, the point from where Ouka had disappeared. "She has used all the few power she was given to create this seal, now she's so tired that she can only go back to the Otherworld again, now. She is going only to see this incoming war, without being able to take part in it." Rika's ancestor looked troubled, thoughtful. She was clearly sorry for her daughter, and there was nothing else she could do. "I wonder whether she's right or not, when she says we can never be really happy. We can only look for a serene life. But I suppose this is a purpose worthy of being pursued, as well."

Rika tried to chase away those sad thoughts, making her focus on the seal itself "But so it would be enough for me not to be informed about their death, or have I misunderstood anything? In this case, my soul..."

"I had thought about this too, but could you stand staying far from the others, oblivious, not caring about your friends' destiny? I think you couldn't, fortunately. Moreover, I think that your role as Queen Carrier has a role in this story, too. Since this disease seems to have been created by a miko, I wouldn't be surprised if there is some hidden link between your soul and the others of the village. Something working at a unconscious level, invisible to me and you, I want to say."

"And of course you can't remove this seal with your actual powers, can you?"

"That would be so nice, but it's not possible. In the end, Ouka would have neither used this spell if I had had the ability cancel it, she perfectly knows my actual condition. The seal she has generated is now deeply connected with your own soul, and removing the former would seriously damage the latter. We have to wait for its charge to end, I'd say five or six months."

"Namely, we would have to wait for the Watanagashi. The ones Ouka had joined will attack before that, I fear, so now I understand the real meaning of her last words."

"Yes, I agree with you. Rika, I'm sorry..." Rika, hearing these words, gave her a light friendly slap on her ancestor's nape. Hanyuu had to stop to spell them, otherwise she would have never grown up. Then, the blue-haired girl asked: "So? What can we do, now?"

"Well, we must inform the others too. But how? We can't claim a spirit has come, you are the chief of the Furude family but, outside the club, I don't know how many people will trust you. Police won't help us, and the adults neither, without some evidence."

"There's another approach, possibly." Rika replied, smiling. She was thinking about Hanyuu's role during the last summer.

"Hauuu?"

"Well... Wouldn't you like to make a new visit to Hinamizawa, Hanyuu?"


	31. Violin strings

**31 – Violin strings**

_Hinamizawa, 2nd January 1984_

It wasn't necessary for Rika to warn her friends of the incoming danger. While she was finishing to talk with Hanyuu, the police had just found the hideaway of the boy who was stalking Rena. In one of the woods surrounding Hinamizawa, not far from the abandoned village of Yagouchi, they had found a little cave, where there were a straw mattress, food leftovers and a couple of photos painting the girl he was obsessed by. He had taken them from a scholastic yearbook, one of those dating back to her period in Ibaraki, as her expression on the photos showed: she was not smiling, on them. It had been the worst period of her life, she hated her mother, she hated the ones claiming to be her friends, she hated her school, but most of all she hated herself, in those days, and her only wish was to go back to Hinamizawa. And all those feelings appeared in that images, in those eyes with no life inside.

The only one who knew about that cave was Satoko. But she had never thought that criminal would hide there. It was quite an unhandy place, far from the village, and there were much better places to use in those woods. Moreover, it was quite near to the Hole. The place where, some year before, a little kid and his father had met their death. She had been told it was a very dangerous zone, and Rika never missed an opportunity to remind it to her. But then it was so for him too, why had he gone there?

Satoko had been quite lucky, in the last period, not to have met him while she was wandering into the woods, arranging new traps or exploring the territory. Rena was the one menaced, but he could be armed, and dangerous, and running into such a person wouldn't have been the most pleasant thing. Even if finally she knew how to defend herself, there. Who knows, maybe the other had been the one lucky, in the end, or rather he had guessed it was better to stay far from her, and draw up a different plan.

So, when Flavia had asked her for a list of all the possible hideaways of the zone, she didn't knew whether adding that one, or not. She had made the right choice, better safe than sorry. But since she knew the zone better than whoever else, she had driven the officers in that hunting, and therefore she was able to see those old photos about Rena. In the beginning, she was shocked by them. The girl on the images was so different from the friend she knew. She was used to have in front of her a calm and serene girl, but the picture described rather a hoodlum, someone angry against everything and everyone. _Her period in Ibaraki must have been really hard, _she thought. Satoko remembered then the days when she didn't belong to the club yet, and she couldn't have fun with all her friends. She realized that she was not so different from her, then. Excluding her Nii-Nii, in that far past she didn't care about anyone, they might all die, for her. But at the same time, she thought to have to be a good girl, for Satoshi's sake, and because she believed her life would have improved, in this way.

Her mind flew then to the days of her infancy, when she played Hide and Seek with the other kids, and she entered the Saiguden by mistake. The Priest had noticed there had been an intruder, but Rika took the responsibility for it, being punished by her father. It was her original sin, and so Satoko got angry with herself, first of all. She hated the way the others behaved towards her and her brother, but she felt somehow guilty for what they had to undergo. That's why she had stopped playing with the other kids, she believed that further problems would have occurred, in that case. And she went on so for months and years, unless the club had been created, and she was nearly obliged to join it.

_Yes, we have all had hard days, but if Rena has been able to go over them, why shouldn't I?_ Satoko concluded, while finishing exploring the little cave. It was empty, nobody was inside it. Where was he? Not far from the entrance, there were quite a lot of cold embers. They weren't warm, so the last night he wasn't there, nights are cold in the woods, and a fire is definitely necessary. So, when he had left the place? Under an empty bag of chips, there was a till receipt, released from a shop in Okinomiya.

"It's strange. Hadn't you asked everyone to signal his presence, in case they had seen his face anywhere?"

"Yes, I did" Flavia answered to Satoko "There is even his identikit picture, still stuck next to the door of the police station. But I've done that two weeks ago, and people are inclined to forget quickly things they don't mind, I fear. Look at the date on this receipt, 30th December."

"So he was here no more than two or three days ago."

"Indeed. If I had been luckier... Or only if I was as frightening as Oishi-san. Those shopkeepers wouldn't dare ignoring his advice, I guess."

"We can't do anything with it, and moreover he's in Hokkaido with his wife, now, let's rather focus on our task, Flavia-san. We should do some questions to who had sold these articles to the fellow we are looking for."

"I agree, even only to make sure he's really the brother of one of the three victims." Flavia read the list of goods reported on the receipt, and she gave a look at the rubbish placed in a corner of the cave, before making a grimace and adding: "Even if I fear they won't help us that much... Ham, meat, and other expensive food... How can a missing boy have all this money to waste? I wouldn't be surprised if he asked someone to enter the shop and buy something for him, or, even worse, if he has stolen them from someone who had just taken them."

"A burglar, then?"

"More or less. Well, compared to the other crimes he's suspected to have committed, this is nothing, his position won't get worse because of this... I will ask if someone has denounced him, but I fear nobody has done it, for a so trivial matter."

"But now? He isn't here, he has left the place, so the most important question is... where?"

"He must have found a better refuge, he couldn't guess we were going to come up here, but finding him in these woods... It reminds me Grandpa's tales, where the Nazis spent whole days uselessly, to drive out the partisans hidden in the mountains around our birth village. It is going to be like looking for the classic needle in a haystack."

Satoko nodded, understanding the difficulty of the research. As Trapmaster, she thought the best strategy would be an ambush, realized thanks to the usage of a bait. But it wasn't acceptable, the bait itself couldn't be anyone else but Rena, and she didn't want her to run that danger. They had to contrive something else, with the others' help.

…

Rena had to be informed of what they had found, even if they weren't good news. That same afternoon, she was convoked at the Manor, with the others, and Satoko told her what she knew. The girl immediately looked troubled, and the smile she endeavored to do a moment later didn't delete that first impression. Her whole group of friends knew which was her real frame of mind, by that time, and they didn't like how things were going.

Mion, in particular, was nervous. As leader of the group, she was feeling like responsible for it, and, despite everyone was trying to give her a hand, she was looking disquiet, being at her wits' end. That annoying affair didn't show any sign of disappearing. And even Hanyuu's return was welcomed more coldly than what Rika had expected. Unluckily, the situation didn't allow a great rejoicing, most her old friends didn't want to celebrate her new arrival. The only ones who really showed a bit of interest were the two Sercos and Satoshi, who had never seen her, and who had got curious because of her horns.

"Oh, these ones?" had replied Shion "Even Kei-chan had asked about them, the first time she had arrived in Hinamizawa. But they are absolutely normal, all the males on this Earth have at least one of them. Don't you have a horn between your legs too, Gi-chan?"

Giancarlo looked askance at her, while Satoshi averted his gaze from the girl, uneasy, and Alice answered, grinning: "Well... I think it's very meaningful you had immediately pointed at that kind of member. Ah, these pervert Japanese girls."

Shion slightly blushed, embarrassed: "That's not a line of mine, I've only repeated what Onee had told the last time. Between the two of us, she's the one mean, don't you agree with me."

"Uh? Have you really told that, Mii-chan?"

"Ah? Oh yes, sure, yes." she answered, not concerned about the dialogue, She was engaged by other worries, downhearted. She was looking at the window, once again, and she hadn't either noticed that Rika and Shion were approaching her, trying to see if they were able to help her anyhow. She was starting to think that all their efforts were useless. _The Dam War, the Oyashiro-sama's curse, the Houjou family, the Yamainu, the JOST, and now this stalker... This village seems condemned to an unhappy life, no matter what we do... And even if we save Rena, what will happen next? Because something else will occur, and we will be obliged to fight, now, and forever... So why should we fight? Once Irie had finished to tune that vaccine, we should let the others go away, towards a better life. I can't force them to live an existence they can't like. _Inside her heart, she was hoping for a world which maybe would have never arrived, and this perspective was discouraging her.

She stood up, stepping towards the door: "Shion, I am a bit tired, I have to rest. Guys, if you have some questions, ask my sister, or my mother. See you soon." she closed the sliding door, and she left the dojo.

Rika turned towards Keiichi: "Mii, what can we do, now? She needs our support."

"Some month ago I would have offered to help her, but after what had happened... I don't feel like trying it again, at least not in the same way." Shion had made up her mind and she had told him why Mion was feeling betrayed by him. Keiichi had listened, and since he wasn't that stupid he had apologized for his behavior. And now he was realizing it was better not to deceive her another time. "So, let's find a different approach. I will help her, for sure, but with all of you, being part of her group of friends, and of her club."

"Do you think we will be able to raise her mood?"

"Why not? She's a strong girl, after all. She is facing a hard moment, but she will go over it."

Rika didn't give up. She wanted her not to be left alone, her mind could have been invaded by the most gloomy thoughts, in this hard period of her: "But someone should go to her room, she needs to unbosom. Who can go there?"

"Rena thinks we should avoid large groups, she would not be at ease, she wouldn't say a word, otherwise. Shii-chan is the most suitable one, she is."

"Should I go alone? Hmmm... I'd prefer a little company. Let's see... Satoshi-kun, would you like to come with me? And you too, Gi-chan."

"Me?"

"Yes. You look the one she talks with the most, in these last days. Let's go, if we play for time we will find her under her futon, and she won't speak at all, claiming she's asleep as a hibernating bear."

Alice looked at the three of them while they were going out of the room, and then she observed Rena, who nodded, seriously. She remembered the day Rena herself had invited her at her home, when the brown-haired girl had given her some good suggestion. That had happened some day earlier, in the same evening when Mion had gone to the Sercos' house to apologize. Her pieces of advice had come to Alice's mind, and she was hoping her impressions were right.

In the meanwhile, instead, Rika eyed Hanyuu, a bit bothered. The purpose of her new reincarnation, in absence of more precise issues, was to take a better control of the whole situation. At least one of the two of them had to attend every meeting, or fact, or event which involved one or more members of the club. But now they were leaving four of their friends alone, in Mion's room, in a complex situation. It was not a good start. And furthermore, going there and joining them now would have only made things worse, it would have been a lack of trust towards them. So, after a moment of reflection, Rika decided to grab her hand, while the others were asking her what she was doing, and to bring her outside the dojo. She would have followed them, but she wouldn't have entered the room. She would have stayed outside it, hearing what was happening. She wanted to be informed about everything.

Rika stopped next to the entrance of the room, and she hid with Hanyuu and the others behind the wall, sure not to be seen. Therefore, while she was closing the door of her sister's bedroom, Shion didn't notice the others were so near to them. Finally, she wasn't searching for them, she was much more concerned about Mion's mood, and about her health, too. She wasn't eating much in the last period, due to her state of worry, and the consequent weakening could make her get some bad disease, even considering they were in winter, and bad flus were always lurking for new victims.

Shion looked around, inside that room, little and austere in spite of the wealthiness of the Sonozaki family. A futon just laid on the floor, a wardrobe, a desk, and a mirror above it. Nothing else. A little lampshade on her desk was the only source of light, the old lamp hanging from the ceiling had been turned off by her sister, and this gave a melancholic atmosphere to the whole room.

Shion approached the desk, noticing that one of its drawers had been opened. Inside it, she could see the math homework she had to finish before the end of the winter break. But all those sheets of paper were blank. Only the instructions and the texts of the exercises were written on it, Mion had reported no answer, during all those days. Chie-sensei wouldn't have been pleased by it, but it was a lesser problem, at the moment. Shion closed the drawer, and she observed the corner of the desk. Leaned on the wall, there was a doll. And not an ordinary one. It was the one Keiichi had given her as present, that past summer. It was terribly important for her, the greatest treasure of her. It reminded her the old happy days.

As a matter of fact, if you looked at it with a disinterested gaze, it was nothing more than a doll, like millions all over the world. Long blond hair made with painted horsehair, great blue eyes, a white ceramic skin and an ordinary dress, adorned with some ordinary lace, nothing special in the end. But if you gave a second look at it, you could notice it was extremely well-kept. The body of the doll had been leaned on the wall with care, to be sure not to cause it some scrape; the hair was well combed, no knots could be found on it, while the dress was clean and ironed, like a new one. It was clear than Mion spent a lot of time arranging its look, locked in her room. She had tons of toys, given by her parents, but that doll was her favorite one. It was the symbol of her unforgotten girlishness, and even if her love dream had shattered, she still remembered with pleasure that sign of kindness towards her.

Therefore, Mion had started considering that doll like a second sister, a younger one. Sometimes, in the past, Shion used to place herself behind the door, and she could hear her speaking to it. Mion told it her most unconfessable secrets, things, facts and feelings she didn't dare to share with nobody, neither with her real sister. Slowly, the doll had become a part of her, a helpmate, a sort of guardian demon. In fact, inside her thoughts she liked to imagine that doll represented the Demon she was claimed to carry. Not a dangerous and savage one, but a spirit looking for a normal life. If the others pretended there was really a Demon inside her, she didn't mind, it was sufficient that that spirit didn't want to scare or torment the others, as her owner didn't. In this way, it would have been evident that such a being would never harm anybody if it wasn't attacked, in spite of its name. With an imaginary rite known only to her, during all this time she was trying to move that essence from her own body to that toy, in order to feel alike a perfectly common girl.

Shion didn't touch the doll. She didn't need it, she had some idea about what her sister had done in those two minutes she was alone. She turned at the futon, then, on which her sister was. Mion wanted to go to sleep, to remove those bad thoughts for a little while, but the others had been faster. Therefore, Shion decided to approach the dialogue in roundabout way, and she asked why she hadn't made her homework yet.

"No, I don't" she answered "Chie-sensei is worried, she goes on stating that I won't be able to pass my entrance exam for the university, if I don't apply myself sufficiently. But how can I do it? I've already a lot of things I have to care, outside school. Maybe, if Batcha had lived some more year, I would have been free to seriously embrace study, but now... I should give up pretending to go to university. I have more important things to think about."

Shion sighed. She knew how important was completing her course of study, for her sister. She wanted to go to university, and learn everything she could, in order to use it for Hinamizawa's welfare. But she was realizing now that her village needed a more immediate support, and she couldn't refuse it. Mion wanted to guarantee a better future for Hinamizawa, but they were still risking not to have a future, they had to face the present.

The pony-tailed girl looked at her sister walking towards the desk. Shion took the doll for a moment, and she caressed it. She couldn't say why, but the doll itself had a sad look, now, as if it was reflecting its owner's feelings. She put it on the desk again, sit on the center of it, this time. Then she asked: "So, have you already decided how to arrange everything?"

Mion shook her head: "Personally I have not a lot of energy, in this period. Things are happening too fast, now. I'd need a little rest, but I can't afford it. I fear that something else will happen, and it will baffle all my previous efforts."

"I thought I was the only pessimist of the group." commented Giancarlo "No, even Rika is, sometimes... However, the crux of the matter is: Why are you thinking so negative? This doesn't belong to you."

"I'm having good teachers." she only answered.

Giancarlo thought it was not a good one. _Is it really my influence, then? Am I really turning her into a desperate woman? It was a bad idea to stay next to her, in these last days. I shouldn't have challenged her at that billiard match. Alice should have been the one who did it, she's much more joyful and resourceful. It's... it's my fault. When they are near to me, people always become sad and dejected..._

Rasing his head, he heard Satoshi speaking: "I... I think to know how you are feeling now, Mion-san. Do you remember when Satoko was depressed, two years ago? I didn't know what to do, I was nearly sure we would have never had a happy future. Without your help, I would have never been able to..."

"That was something I could arrange alone. But now it's different, and harder by far. This time, there is a real enemy to face, somebody who wants to harm Rena-chan, or all of us, I've still not understood it. We have not just the aura of fear and mistrust towards the Houjous, in front of us."

"You're right. And in fact I don't have an answer to all your problems. But... But I... I can say I have lived your same worries. It's something... I was able to defeat, somehow. And if a weak person like me has been able to do it... a strong girl like you can't..."

"I'm not so strong as you think. But thank you very much for your words, I appreciate them."

Shion had the impression hers were just platitudes, said because of the circumstance. She approached her sister, and she sat on her same futon, to observe her closely. But, as answer, Mion stood up, as to avoid her interrogatory gaze. She leaned on her desk, closing the drawer and lowering her eyes. Shion stood up in turn, and she walked towards her, but the pony-tailed girl stopped her with a sign of her hand.

"Why do you want to stay far from me, Onee?"

"Why do you want to stay so close to me, Shion, instead? Are you thinking I am a stupid little girl, now?"

"What? No, how can you only imagine I was thinking so..."

"Then, consider me like an adult, and show me a few respect."

"I don't think... Shion-san had presumed you were a childish girl." replied Satoshi "She's just worried. I can understand that when... when she is so she starts to be overprotective, and you may dislike it, but... you should be in her shoes, and find the strength to react, someway. We all need to feel your energy, otherwise... otherwise we can't do it."

"You are going on thinking I am a very strong woman, but that's not true, Satoshi-kun."

"I know that's true... instead. You had proved it a lot of times, in the past. When I was with you... and when I was not with you, too."

Shion nodded, thanking Satoshi for his words. He was trying to help her, in the only way he could imagine, because he didn't want to feel useless, again. He thought not to have been able to help his sister, in the past, and that sense of loss was something he was resolute not to live anymore. But he couldn't find out what he could do, exactly. He could see Mion, near to him, who was showing the most fragile side of her nature, the most similar one to his character. But, since he hadn't been able to brace up when it had been his turn, he didn't know what to do with Mion herself.

He looked at Shion, who was finding herself in his same situation. She feared that each word she said could make things get worse. In the past she would have asked for a speech of encouragement by Keiichi, but that kind of words are like cigarettes: once you start to get used to them, they have no more effect. As well, those words would become empty and meaningless, if repeated too often; you spell them because you feel the need to do it, but you don't really believe in what you say.

Shion closed her eyes, a bit frustrated. But when she opened them again, she noticed that someone else had leaned on the desk, just next to her sister.

"Mii-chan" said Giancarlo "There is a thing you should consider. I suppose you want all of us to live happily, for as much time as we've allowed to. Don't you?"

Mion nodded. "Good. So, now you are thinking that, even if you fight with us for Hinamizawa and its inhabitants, we _might _run into a miserable end. Am I right?"

Another nod. "Well, so... Haven't you imagined that, if you surrender, if we surrender, we are destined to _surely_ run into it, instead?"

"_Surely_?" Mion scanned him, got curious because of the way he underlined that word.

"Yes, _surely. _Rena alone would be in a deadly danger, and without your support what would have happened, last December? I know that human efforts don't always bring to a happy ending, there are a lot of real stories which show the opposite. But doing our best is every thing which is left to us. Otherwise our life and our death will be full of regrets, and they will become even worse."

"So, you want to do what you are allowed to do... you have told me something similar, some day ago, while we were riding that tandem."

"If I'm repeating this concept, it's because I do believe in it. When you are told tragic stories, when you read them on a newspaper, when you watch them on TV... you understand that this is not a paradise. That every idyll, every happy environment, every moment when you're happy and without worries... they are all crystal heavens. They last less than a flutter of a butterfly. In real life, sentence like _And they lived happily ever after _is never borne out of the facts."

"So? What can we do, in your opinion?" asked Satoshi.

"Apply ourselves" answered Mion "In order to make our real world as similar as possible to a paradise. Is this what you mean?"

"I'd say so. _Ideals are like stars: you will not succeed in touching them with your hands, but like the seafaring man on the ocean desert of waters, you choose them as your guides, and following them, you reach your destiny._"

"Very nice words" commented Shion "Who spelt them?"

"Carl Schurz... a German politician of the 19th century, we could say. You know, there haven't been only Japanese philosophers, in world history, we Westerners have developed our own culture, during all this millennia, too."

"And you like to repeat words who don't belong to you, I see..."

"There's nothing bad about this, Shii-chan. Moreover, that was a sentence that Keresana-san had told me, some year ago. His wife, I mean, Kogorou-san had never been that fond of literature. She likes quoting savant men of the past, and personally I do think that's a good habit, once you use those words properly, and you are aware of what they really mean."

Shion showed to want to change argument, so the three of them turned towards Mion. She hadn't been convinced yet, and in fact she said: "You are asking me to fight for something abstract, something I don't either know what it is."

"It's not true. Think about it. When you have fought the JOST, you have fought to give all of us a future in Hinamizawa, and not to make us happy for the rest of our lives. Yours was a purpose smaller than creating an idyllic world, but it was a tangible one. And now, it's just the same. Think about little things you can do, if you want to do something, and you'll suddenly realize to be greatly useful, for all your friends."

"But you are asking me to strive for something which is destined to last neither a day, maybe! When... when we had faced the Yamainu, I was thinking that, after having defeated them, we would have gone back to a quiet life, with only lesser issues. Now, instead, you are claiming that my life, and yours too, will be an endless war, without a second to enjoy what we have built around us."

"It's not so dramatic, Mii-chan, I don't think there is someone who wants to destroy Hinamizawa every month..."

Mion didn't appreciate his light irony, and her angry gaze made Giancarlo quickly regretting that last sentence. He was definitely not good at speaking. Then, the pony-tailed girl added: "It's so frustrating... It would be... it would be so easy, if I could sweep all my problems with a simple gesture, like this." She abruptly turned behind the desk, sticking out her arm and spinning quickly around, as if she wanted to get rid of every thing around her, of every nuisance which was teasing her. Unluckily, she had forgotten about what Shion had done some moment before.

The doll was still there, sat in the middle of the desk, instead of in her usual corner, next to the wall. Not being able to avoid it, she violently slammed it, and before she could realize what had happened, the doll had already reached the border of the desk. And it quickly went over it, starting to fall to the ground.

The four of them heard a loud noise, mangling like a breaking glass, unbearable to such a degree that they were forced to close their eyes. After having opened them again with a few fatigue, they moved her eyes slowly, foretelling it wouldn't have been a nice scene, and they gazed at the point where the doll had fallen.

The head of the doll was a meter far from the rest of the body, while one of the eyes had come out of its orbit, and now it was likely inside the head itself, like a marble in an earthenware jar. The nose had come off the face, leaping to the opposite corner of the room. The soft light of the lampshade was enough to make that small piece of porcelain shine, as if it wanted to show to everyone where it had gone. The only thing not completely broken was its hair. Most of the horsehair was still stuck to its forehead, but one or two hairs had remained on Mion's hand, as sign of what she had done, as sign of her guilt. The others, instead, were covering the mouth of the doll, and the eye which had remained in its place.

Rolled in that position, the face of the doll seemed to look at who had pushed her to the floor, but the missing eye, the absence of the nose and the moved hair gave to it a disturbing air. Its seemed the glance of a dead girl, of a corpse and there was no chance it would have moved her gaze, even if Mion had ordered it to do that. Even if it belonged to an inanimate object, that look was condemning her. No, it wasn't exactly condemning her. Mion suddenly concluded that if there was really a spirit inside that doll, it was pitying her.

Giancarlo took the nose of the doll from the corner of the room, and then he picked up the head, leaning on the desk again. Then he touched its body, which seemed still integer, thanks to its little dress. But, by the sound produced, he immediately sounded to have a bag full of pieces of glass, into his hands.

He looked at Mion, sorrowful. The girl didn't move, pale and immobile as if her heart had broken into pieces. She would have liked to shout, to express all her frustration, but she didn't. She limited herself to turn back, resolute not to show her face anymore to the others, at least until the end of that day. Slowly, she whispered: "Have you seen... Gi-chan? You have made all that speech starting from the assumption I can be useful, but you haven't considered I could become a hindrance, rather. I thought to be a tomboy, once, but I am even worse than it, I'm a muddler, a dad, a failure, I don't know why Batcha thought I would have been such a great chief..."

"Mi... Mion..."

"Do you remember some day ago, when I had asked you to give me some advice, when I needed it? My decision was a mistake. I mustn't be counseled, for the simple reason I don't deserve to hold this role." As pushed by an invisible force, Mion turned at them, slowly. Her eyes had become an endless well, full of nothing but darkness. She was becoming a broken doll, in turn "Please take those shards, and throw them into the bust bin. Yes... that doll... shouldn't be the only one which has to go there."

Giancarlo felt uncomfortably, he couldn't allow that dialogue to end so, but Shion put a hand on his shoulder, shaking her head: "Let's leave her alone, for a moment... There are times when you have to think about yourself, with nobody else around. I know Onee, don't worry, we'll be able to help her effectively in a next future, but not now."

Mion nodded, to confirm that wish of her. She was like exhausted, she just wanted to go to bed, in the darkness, alone. So, Giancarlo finished gathering all the pieces of the doll, and while whispering _Sorry, I'm not a great motivator_ he went out of the room, with the other two. After having closed the door, they saw Rika and the others, who had heard everything. Rena looked at Shion, and she asked how she was, in the end.

Shion lowered her head, and she answered: "I would lie, if I say she's fine. But it's not the first time I see her so desperate. In the past, it had happened so often..."

"Really?"

"Yes. And despite all she had been able to face them, in the end. I'm so worried... but I don't surrender. I know she's able to fight against this sort of depression. No, I won't surrender."


	32. The two of spades

**32 – ********The two of spades**

**_Hinamizawa, 6th January 1984_**

Two girls, alone, inside one of the rooms of the Sonozaki Manor. In front of them, a mirror. Next to them, a comb, a brush and other objects for the care of the look.

One of the girls took an elastic band, and slowly she started combing her long green hair, and when she finished to arrange it an endless ponytail had appeared. Then she took the brush and she started moving it up and down, to make sure it was smooth and without knots. It took quite a long time, and that repetitive movement beat the passing time, like a gentle human pendulum. But the result of her effort was satisfying, it couldn't be better than that, as the other girl confirmed with a nod. Then the green-haired girl stood up, and she looked in the mirror. The long pink skirt, the yellow vest, the short-sleeved white shirt and the well knotted tie. She hadn't worn those clothes for quite a long time, three or four months at least, and she had got unused to them. But they still suited her, and she quickly felt at ease, after all they were light and comfortable. Without saying a word, she checked every detail of her look, and finally she smiled, finding that everything was fine.

The other girl looked at her ponytail, again, and she asked: "Do you think nobody will recognize you, Shion-san?"

The green-haired girl turned towards Satoko, who had just remarked her with that note. It was the first time she had seen Shion while switching her identity with her sister's one, so it was normal to be wary.

"Do you think it's possible?"

"Well... I don't know. You're really identical now, I have to admit it. But your behavior can't be the same as hers, there will always be a minimal difference, in my humble opinion. And if he's smart enough he'll be able to find out the truth..."

"They have _never_ been able to, until now, so I would be surprise if today will end differently. Now, where is my coat? Okinomiya's prefecture is a very heated building, but outside it's still winter. Oh my, why my dear Uncle hates coldness so much?"

"Here it is." Satoko opened a large cellophane bag, and she looked at the light blue jacket which was inside it. She handed it to Shion, who thanked her and wore it, to check if it suited the skirt which appeared below it.

"Hmm... a jacket and a summer skirt... I'm not sure it's a good arrangement..." commented Satoko.

"I don't think so. Luckily this is a long skirt, so I can combine it with long socks, or even with pantyhose, if necessary. And finally covering clothes are very fashionable, in this last period. I've seen that in Okinomiya a lot of girls wear them, even in summer."

"They will sweat quite a lot..."

"Indeed. There will be other people dressed like me, there, so I'm not worried. And in the end I'm going to get rid of this jacket immediately, once I enter the prefecture. I don't want to become a human fountain."

"If you say so..."

"I don't understand what's the matter" Shion exclaimed, tired of those remarks, carrying an evil smile "After all, everything will run fine, but if I am wrong, they will pity Onee, not me..."

Satoko sighed, commiserating her friend's immaturity. Then she asked Satoshi, who was just outside the room, to enter. She wished to ask him if Shion was ready to go, in his opinion. She knew that her friend terribly cared his point of view, it was normal after all. After his positive confirm, she took the comb, the brush and all the rest, and she returned them into their place, a big black beauty case. _I wonder if they share this box, when they have to comb each other... _she thought. Taking care of that head of hair is not easy, and you must look for help from someone. It would be natural, if they had decided to avail of the same tools to do that. Firstly one of the twins assists the other one, and once she has finished they switch their roles, using the same brushes. It wouldn't be a bad idea, in this way they would save some time too. And it would be also a nice chance to talk with each other, a pleasant moment of the day. In the past, when Shion was in the Academy and Mion alone in the Manor, it must have been much more sad and depressing, she concluded.

"However" added Satoko "I'm still concerned about the next days... Will you have always to take Mion-san's place, now?"

"Hmm... No, I would dislike that. We could claim this is an extemporaneous help by me, an assistance I can give her sometimes... but I can't pretend to be her every time she has an official meeting with someone. I am not used to it, and I have not been taught for this purpose, unlike her."

"But it's unreasonable, thinking that she will be fine again, after a day or two... she needs more time, don't you think so, Nee-Nee?"

Shion raised her eyes, towards the ceiling. Yes, maybe Satoko was right. That day, Mion was not fit to meet anybody outside her group of friends, and even they had some problems in spelling more than a few words with her. Old good times where she loved to chat and joke with the others really seemed to have passed away, definitely. She felt alike depressed, unable to react, in spite of the others' efforts. Therefore, Shion had chosen to do what she could, at least for now, which was replacing her in the meeting between the Prefect and the chief of the Sonozaki family. But honestly she didn't mind either the subject of the incoming discussion (_the JOST? Rena? Something else? Who cares... they will tell us nothing new, in the end_), rather she had got restless because of Mion's response, when her sister had announced her will. Or, in order to be more exact, she had got worried of the absence of any response. She had simply nodded, hearing her words, and after a hinted thanksgiving she had gone out for a walk, alone, as if she had just been freed from a nuisance.

"What are you planning to do, if Mion-san doesn't recover, then?" asked Satoko again, thoughtful.

"I don't know, is that OK? I couldn't refuse to help her, but I can't think about a brilliant strategy, now, I have something else to care." she answered, a bit nervous. But she was aware the blond-haired girl was right. "I can't say it has been a willing choice of mine, after all. I was... nearly obliged to do it. Onee simply has to stay here, and rest until tomorrow, and for the whole weekend too, if necessary. And in the meanwhile, I am the only one who can replace her, at the moment."

In that moment, Shion noticed that her handkerchief had fallen from her pocket, perhaps due to her sudden movement, to her nervy reaction. It would be nice if Satoshi took it for her, but usually he was so absent-minded... She'd better to be on it, after all, inside herself, she had taken the commitment to keep watch over Satoko and him, and there was no time for gallantry, especially in that instant. She loved Satoshi for what he was, and not for what he wasn't. So, she sat down on the floor, to pick up the handkerchief, and she saw that, next to it, there was some grain of powder, which formed a gray spot on the brown wood. It had to be fallen while Satoko was making her up. So, instinctively, Shion started to draw on that spot, as if it was a white blackboard. She was a worse drawer than her sister, but she remembered that Mion was used to reproduce animal shapes, when she wanted to divert her mind. She did so also at school, that day, in front of them all... Maybe her work of art wouldn't have been appreciable, but she might feel all the better for it, it was worthy a try, finally.

Some second later, she stopped. There was no powder enough on the floor, and the lines she had traced were hardly visible. She couldn't draw anything, on it. Maybe it was because she was only Mion's sister... She was her copy, her fake copy. In the end, even when they were little, the girl named Shion was seen with a halo of distrust. Oryou had allowed her to live, but a lot of relatives inside the Sonozaki family thought the old woman had been too large-hearted, towards her. Maybe was she a sort of backup copy, to use only if something bad happened to Mion? If there was no Mion anymore, Shion's importance would have increased greatly, likely. They would have appreciated her as Shion, she wouldn't have to become Mion to have a bit of esteem, and she wouldn't have felt the need to take her place sometimes, and... But she would have never harmed her sister, she seemed the only one who cared about her. It would have been the worst thing Shion could do...

Shion closed her eyes, and she scratched her head, to remove those past thoughts. The two sisters were used to share this kind of feelings. Finally, they couldn't do differently. Neither of them was a good liar, and a glance was enough for one of the twins to understand what the other one was feeling. That was why Shion was there now, wearing Mion's clothes. And that was why she said:

"Satoko-chan, Satoshi-kun... Please stay here at the Manor, while I am away. If you came with me, it would be suspicious, since you are always seen together with Shion. And Onee needs your help much more than me. Don't leave her alone for any reason, in this hours, I beg you."

…

In the same moment, most of the remaining members of the group was inside Irie's Clinic. The doctor had to make an important announcement, and fortunately there was good news by the medic. Indeed, he had deliberately convoked all of them, to raise their mood in that difficult moment.

"I would have invited Mion-san here, too, but she had to go and see the Prefect for a meeting, I was told, and I didn't want to wait for her return... You'll be happy to hear what I want to say."

"You have done significant steps towards the realization of the definitive cure against the Syndrome, haven't you?"

Rika had a peculiar way to pulverize the others' excitation, and Irie eyed her, with a few discontent. But he quickly regained his smiled, and he exclaimed: "Yes, you're right. I'm getting very close to the final solution of this ancestral problem. You can't say how much I'm glad to be allowed to claim that!"

"Hauuu, it's a great achievement, congratulations!" answered Hanyuu.

Rena smiled, hearing her little friend's words. Indeed, they hadn't had good news for quite a long time, and Irie's idea was exactly what they needed. Even if seeing Takano by them didn't make them that joyful. She was wordless and melancholic as always... No, maybe she was getting even worse. Somehow, seeing all those young boys happy and cheerful around her... it made her slightly less sad, in the past months. But in the last days they had to take care of a lot of issues, and they hadn't time to play. The environment inside the school had suffered from this change, like the one inside the clinic too, and that missing touch of felt peace was having negative effects on her psyche. In the end, she wasn't either smiling, unlike the past, when she exerted to show at least a little reaction to the external stimuli, from time to time.

Rika had noticed it, and she disliked that sight. _I wonder if she will recover... but most of all I wonder if this will be even Mion's destiny... This absence of will, this hopeless desperation... I'm sorry for Takano, but there's nothing special I can do for her, now. Mion's situation, instead, scares me so much... What will happen, if she loses her mind? To her, but also to the others, and me...? She's the leader of our club, and the chief of the Sonozaki family, and of the village... The others can't ignore a breakdown from her, and in this case Chaos will rule over Hinamizawa..._

She shook her head, energetically. It wouldn't have happened, and after all Irie's words wanted to give them a new hope, as a matter of fact. Then, since the others had seen her sudden movement, when Keiichi and Irie asked her what the matter was, she answered that everything was OK, and so the doctor went on speaking:

"Well... I managed to make that group of molecules stable. Do you remember when I've told you that the ATPC protein decomposed, after a while? I've found the necessary enzymes to make sure it lasts for a sufficient period of time. Now, if I inject it inside a human body, I am pretty sure it will give good results."

"_Pretty _sure? Rena is not sure to understand." asked the brown-haired girl.

"You're right... I've made a satisfying number of in vitro experiments, but we will need further tests. I can't dispense it without being sure it's a safe remedy."

"How much time?" asked Rika, abruptly.

"Well, What may I answer... Some month? That's the standard period, when you have to test a vaccine theoretically ready to use. If we're lucky enough, everyone will be given a final dose of it in ninety days, starting from today."

_It would mean waiting for the end of March, at least... But, if I well interpret Irie's words, that heal might arrive also in April, or in May, or in June... and Ouka had said we will die before the next Watanagashi, so it would be useless. We need that medicine, it would be a powerful weapon, a shield against our enemies' possible strategies. But that's not the only matter. All Irie's efforts... It would be a terrible pity, if a sad casualty frustrated what he has done during all these years. This is the research he has dedicated most of his life as doctor to, this is his reason to live... In a certain sense, it would recur what happened to Takano and her grandfather's studies, but this time the consequences would me much more tragic._

"Oh, all right" exclaimed Hanyuu, breaking the thread of Rika's inner arguments "We can wait for it, it's such a short period, after all, considering how much time your study has taken until now... Please go on working with passion and devotion, but with no hurry, I wouldn't like to have a drug realized hastily, full of dangerous contraindications..."

"I-I'd never dare to do such a mistake..." replied Irie, with a shroud of embarrassment. But Hanyuu's sentence was not directed to him, rather to Rika. Hanyuu had guessed her descendant's thoughts, and she wanted her to understand that anxiety was the worst of their allies, in that moment. Irie had to finish his job quietly, making pressure on him was not the good choice. So, Rika nodded, showing to have understood, and Hanyuu smiled cheerfully, relieved.

In that moment, the door of Irie's office was opened, suddenly. Everyone inside looked at who did it so brusquely, surprised.

"To-Tomita-kun!" exclaimed Keiichi "Why are you here?"

"I bring incredibly important news, I had to tell you at once!" the little boy answered, panting after the long run. "Rena-san, some women have seen a boy, not far from a village. A foreigner, we have never seen him for sure. But he was wandering around the village, and he had a picture of you in his hands!"

"WHAT?" shouted Keiichi. Rena opened her eyes wide, and Rika and Hanyuu immediately reached Tomita, asking him for as many details as possible.

"Where is he now? Please, answer!"

"I-I haven't seen him in person, but they have told me he was not far from the Shrine, the last time he was seen."

"How much time ago?"

He looked at the clock, and he made a pair of quick count, before answering "Twenty, thirty minutes at most."

"He can't have gone away so far from the Shrine, then!" exclaimed Keiichi "This is an incredible chance, he has committed a fatal mistake! We must get him!"

"And how?" asked Rena.

"If only Satoko was here... We might bring him inside one of the woods around the Shrine, he wouldn't exit alive from them... but she had to stay with Shion and Mion... and calling her now would cost too much time."

"I can take her place, then."

"Huh? Are you sure, Rika-chan?"

"Oh, don't worry, when Satoko lived with me she has taught me some cute cheat, and she has shown me how the traps next to my house work. Of course, she did that in order to allow me to avoid them, but also for the necessary maintenance. You know, she can't always come to me and arrange everything... So don't worry, I know which kind of device better suits such an enemy..." Rika's smile got a strange expression, halfway between the cutest happiness of an innocent girl and the cruelest wish of a sadistic woman. She wanted to have revenge on that fellow, her will became strong as never before, in that moment. She had a goal, in front of her, and she knew how to achieve it.

…

It wasn't hard to lead their target towards the wished point. Keiichi phoned to his father, and he asked him to look for a boy with a photo in his hands, not far from the Shrine. He obeyed, after all he was a visionary artist who was looking constantly for new inspirations, which usually meant he had nothing to do that day, as well as a lot of other ones. The man was able to find him quite easily, that boy had kept on wandering in the zone next to the temple, and a foreigner is always immediately noticeable, in a little village. Therefore, once he had reached him, he told him that the girl he was searching for was not far from that place, that she was used to spend most of her afternoons in a certain glade inside the woods, with her friends, and he showed the path to follow. Finally, he had to call his son again, to confirm that everything had gone has expected.

Now, Rika, Hanyuu, Keiichi and Rena were ready. The brown-haired girl was in the middle of the clearing, as bait. The others, instead, were behind a group of bushes, pending his arrival.

Rena stood there for a while, a few anxious. What will happen, when he sees the object of his paranoia, in front of him? What will happen, when she sees the source of her discomfort, in front of her? According to Keiichi and Rika's plan, there was a deep hole hidden between the entrance to the glade and her, so if he simply ran straightforward he would never be able to reach her, he would fall before even trying to lay a hand on her. But was he such a brainless boy, after all? He nearly had been able to kill her, that day at the Prefecture, and only Keiichi's intervention had saved her. And nobody had seen anything, that criminal had vanished, leaving no clues behind him. About where he hid himself, and about his future intentions... It took a lot of time to find his old hideaway, he had chosen a place nobody had thought about, in the beginning, and he was still being in circulation, now.

He was sly, therefore. Not an incapable one, for sure. So, what if he had been provident, and he had carried a gun? In that case he would shoot her from a large distance, as soon as he could glimpse at her. Traps would be useless, and her friends wouldn't be fast enough to block him, nor she could run away. She would be an easy target. _Why hasn't Keiichi-kun thought about this possibility?_

No, it wasn't possible. That boy couldn't have a weapon. The other villagers would have noticed it, and Keiichi's father confirmed that it was all right. Moreover, she remembered that the other boys hadn't been killed with a gun, they had written it on the cuttings she was sent, some time ago. It would have been strange, if he wanted to make her have a different treatment, for any reason. She had to stay calm, Keiichi would have thought about a countermeasure, if the risk of facing a gun had been real. She had to stay calm, indeed. But, even if her look didn't show it, she was scared.

_Why Keiichi-kun is not my boyfriend? Why hasn't he shared my feelings towards him? His assistance would be so priceless, it would be... _In the end, she was alone. Keiichi didn't want to become her partner, and she hadn't politely refused to have a love affair with Giancarlo. She had realized that Alice was pushing her, making her spending a lot of time together with him, and stimulating the dialogue between the two of them... She imagined they would have made a nice couple. But neither of them was feeling anything special towards the other one, and Rena had clearly explained it to the Italian girl. Alice had looked a bit disappointed, due to that response, and to her mistake too, but she had seemed to have understood, and she had thanked her for her sincerity.

But now Rena was alone. There were no policemen, next to her. After all, she had asked Flavia to remove her escort, a couple of days ago. The presence of those officers, however much they were kind and polite, was becoming more and more oppressive, from day to day. She wished a normal life, and unless they had left her she wouldn't have obtained it. In the end, when she talked with the other villagers, at the market, at the Shrine, or whenever she was used to go, she knew they were pitying her, because she _had _to be accompanied by them. She couldn't accept it, having a serene life was something incredibly important, for her. She even feared to be driven crazy, if the situation hadn't changed. She preferred to have only her friends, around her, and she didn't accept to change her mind, until she finally convinced Flavia. Was she risking, because of that choice? Were her friends risking? No, they weren't, in Rena's opinion. She knew what they were capable to do, if necessary. The War against the Yamainu had proven it.

But in that moment she realized to be somehow defenseless. _Where's my nata?, _she started to ask herself. It was in the dump, well hidden inside that little abandoned van she had found a lot of time ago. She didn't want anyone to find it, handling such a weapon might be dangerous, if you're not used to it. And this precaution by her had caused it to be too far from her. She needed that cleaver, it would have made her calmer. Some people used to spin a pen to dull their stress... she used to carry a nata, and going around the dump, instead. There was nothing bad in it, after all.

That long thinking process was driving her to some old memory, hidden in her mind. _How were they calling it...__"Ronin Mawashi", or something similar... _She had run into that trend in Ibaraki, firstly. She was used to see the other students moving their pens ceaselessly, creating new and spectacular tricks only to amaze their friends and schoolmates. An infinite deft manipulation of a writing instrument. But she didn't like it, it didn't enthuse her. In that period going back to Hinamizawa was the only bee in her bonnet. So, she really started to enjoy it when she looked Keiichi trying to do it. He had just arrived from Tokyo, and he was aware of that genre of self-entertainment, too. The way he was able to spin his pens immediately caught the others' attention, especially Mion's one. She quickly learned to move it in the proper way, and in a few days she was able to execute incredible tricks. They spent a lot of afternoons playing that kind of activity, trying to find out who was the Master of Rolling Pens...

A sudden step woke up Rena from her dreams. Next to the entrance to the glade, she could perceive an indistinct form.

Rika and Keiichi had placed some brushwood in that zone, so the noise caused by his arrival would have made his presence manifest at once. She wouldn't have had bad surprises. But... was he really the boy the others had seen at the village? Yes, likely he was. She couldn't distinguish his outline, but, while he was approaching her, she could see there was a white object into his right hand. A piece of paper, probably. The picture of her, possibly.

The boy kept on stepping forward, apparently slowly and quietly. _He must have seen me, and he wants to approach me... Why does he want to do that? What's his plan? _He was still far from her, there were at least twenty-thirty meters between the two youths. From that distance, Rena could see his brown hair, and his limited height. He was shorter than her, she guessed. He was wearing a pair of glasses, furthermore. _But... A pair of glasses? _She realized. There was something wrong. She didn't know what, but there was something unexpected. Something Keiichi and Rika hadn't calculated.

"Ryuugu Rena?" asked the boy, suddenly. He likely had realized that she might be really the girl she was searching for.

What had she to answer? She knew the name of her stalker, but she wasn't sure about the most suitable manner to answer. Being aggressive? Looking scared? Rika had just asked her to stay there, but she added nothing else. They supposed that boy would have run towards her, attacking immediately. They didn't imagine such a scene would have occurred. Now, theoretically, she was allowed to say what she pleased.

"Ryuugu Rena?" the boy repeated "Are you Ryuugu Rena?"

"Yes. My name is Ryuugu Rena." she limited to answer, inexpressively. They were ten meters far from each other, now, and she could observe him better. His eyes were brown, exactly like his hair. Quite short and slim, with quite a high number of freckles on his face. And he did wear a couple of glasses, as she had noticed before.

Rena unconsciously stepped backward. His look was... disturbing. He didn't look so anger as she had imagined. Maybe he was similar to her, his feelings weren't used to appear externally. But inside he might be a real devil. He didn't have any weapon, he was only carrying that photo. But he might have a gun, hidden somewhere, so what had she to do, now?

The boy stopped to walk. He was just in front of the big hole prepared for him. Just a further step and he wouldn't have been able to harm anyone, anymore. But why had he stopped? _He is... smiling? Is he foretasting what he is going to do, inside his ill mind?_ Rena didn't know the real meaning of that grin. She felt alike disorientating. That boy was preparing something terrible, and the fact he wasn't showing any sign of maleficence was making him even more spine chilling.

_Here he is. _Slowly, without even looking at her, he put a hand behind him, as to take something from one of his pockets. That was the moment to act. Keiichi and Rika immediately moved the lever they had next to them. Rena, seeing them with the corner of her eye, smiled in turn. _Fortunately I have my friends. They are going to save me! This boy won't harm me, I will be safe, and I'm going to live quietly here in Hinamizawa, after having helped also Mii-chan, too. Yes, this boy won't persecute me anymore, he won't dare to spell my name, he won't dare to look for me, he won't dare to call me Ryuugu Rena. Yes, he won't dare to call me..._

She froze, suddenly, hit by a strange idea.

"R-R-Ryuugu Rena?" she asked him "Had you spelt Ryuugu _Rena_?"

The one in front of her hadn't any time to answer. A giant trunk suddenly appeared behind the boy, coming from who knows where, and he hit him violently, pushing him towards the hole, which made the job it had been built for.

A second later, Keiichi and Rika were by her, smiling. They were happy to have captured that villain, and now that one of their nightmares had been defeated, they were certain that even the other ones would have followed its same destiny.

But their satisfaction quickly vanished, noticing their friend's reaction. Rena wasn't happy. She was looking shocked, rather. Shocked, and regretful. Incredibly slowly, she whispered: "T-that isn't him..."

...

It took a minute or two to help that boy to go up again from the bottom of the trap. Fortunately, Rika had suggested Keiichi to bring with them the ladder she used to have behind her house. So, he rose up quickly, and he got the others' apology.

"I-I'm really sorry to have caused you such troubles" explained Rena "You know, in his letter that stalker had called me with my old name... _Reina_, I mean. While you had used the right one, so I had to realize at once you were not him, I had... But Rena was so sure you were the boy who was pursuing me that I've neither controlled whether you really were that person or not, even if I have seen his picture a lot of times..."

"It's fine, it's my fault" he answered "I've come here without introducing myself, I must have been looking like a suspected individual."

"So we've made a blunder" exclaimed Keiichi "But may we know who are you, in the end?"

"Ah sure, I still have to tell you" he stood up, and while regaining his lost decorum he announced: "My name is Nabiha Daijiro, pleased to meet you."

"_Nabiha_-san?" shouted Rika, shocked.

"Yes..." he answered, visibly embarrassed "I am the son of who you have sent to prison. The first-born son, to be exact."

He was incredible. In front of them, they had a boy who wasn't older than them, likely. Instead, his father was quite old, surely over 50 years old. Hanyuu was about to make that note, but Rika blocked her before she could open her mouth, treading on his foot unnoticeably and vigorously. The purple-haired girl wasn't there in Hinamizawa, in the past weeks, and she was supposed to have never seen that man. She had to be careful about what she said to the others, and that (probably) light pain would have be a sufficient reminder.

But Hanyuu, who forbore shouting to avoid worse and spicy punishments, was still curious. And Rika couldn't deny that question of her had some sense. So she took her ancestor's place, and she asked Daijiro about his age.

"I'm 16" he replied. As aged as Keiichi, finally "Yes, I see, probably you're begging why I am so young, compared to my father. Well, he got married very late, he was not far from the forties. I suppose that love can work also in this way."

"You can't rule your heart, they say." replied Keiichi "But now, let's go to the most juicy part of this interrogation. Why are you here? Why are you looking for Rena?"

"You have the right to ask that to me, and I will answer at once. I am here to apologize."

Rena looked at him, interested in what he was about to say: "I am aware of what my father has done to all of you. You know, in the last period he had started to behave strangely, he was obsessed by the importance of our lost familiar honor, and by the way to regain it. I don't blame him, I may understand the reasons which have pushed him, but I don't accept the way he has chosen to reach this purpose. Driving innocent people to their ruin doesn't make you worthy of more respect. It's just the opposite, instead. And in spite of this natural truth, he hasn't put up a fight against the madness which was rising inside his mind. And he has done what he has done. At least this is what I know about this story, what my mother has told me. I have to admit that I wasn't with them, in fact. I lived in Osaka until the beginning of the year with my uncles, and as soon as I have been informed about what has happened I've come back to Okinomiya; that's why I came here only today, to apologize. I had to check if everything at home was fine, and once I had finished to arrange all the issues of my family I've immediately looked for you. And especially for Ryuugu-san."

"For me, you are saying, you are?"

"Yes. I know what has occurred to you, during the three explosions at the Prefecture. I know that someone has tried to kill you. Someone at the Prefecture informed me about all the details, he also gave me a photo picturing you, I wouldn't have recognized you, otherwise."

"You are talking about the piece of paper you're holding, you are... But you needn't to apologize for it. Your father has nothing to do with this story."

"That's not true, not completely at least. That criminal had taken advantage of a favorable situation created by my father, so he has some responsibility for it. And then I have, too."

"What do you mean?"

"I'm here as representative of my family. My grandfather is dead some time ago, and my father is still in prison, so it's my turn to take the control of the situation. I'm here to pay back the debt the Nabihas have towards you. Unless I think this debt has been paid in full, I will consider myself as your servant. Therefore, if you need any favor, or if there is anything you think I can do for you, don't hesitate and contact me. I will come immediately from Okinomiya to Hinamizawa, and I will assist you."

The others went on scanning him, astonished.

"Y-you are a real samurai, I suppose..." Keiichi commented, finally.

"The Nabihas are an old warlike family, so I suppose you're not wrong. We have always had a strong sense of honor, and we use it for better or for worse, as you've already seen."

"Like the Sonozakis, essentially. Bushido lives again, in these isolated zones of the world." replied Rika. Seen from her perspective, he was a very strange boy, but probably he wasn't dangerous. Since he had decided to stay in Okinomiya, there were no problems about any effect of the Syndrome, no matter how many times he came to Hinamizawa. And Irie would have given the drug to him too, once it had been ready.

"Well" Keiichi exclaimed, grinning ironically "We might use you even for lesser jobs. You know, Dad asked me to repair the roof of my house, and-"

"WE CAN'T!" shouted Rena, throwing an uppercut to Keiichi's chin "It's not fair, I don't want to have that kind of servant. I could neither bring you at home!"

"L-leading me at your house, you're saying?" answered Daijiro, while looking at the other boy who had fainted at Rena's feet, a bit uneasy "It would be unconventional, indeed... But if it's necessary... I do want to pay back my debt, otherwise I will always feel guilty towards you."

"But it wouldn't be fair..." the brown-haired girl objected. But Hanyuu had another idea:

"Rena-san, why don't you ask him to spend some time with us, as a sort of new friend? For his point of view, he will escort you. From yours, you will have fun with a new friend."

Rika nodded, agreeing about that good idea, while Rena thought about it, raising her eyes towards the sky. Finally she sighed, and she answered: "I'd say it's the best choice. What do you say about it, Daijiro-kun? Is it fine, for you, is it?"

"I agree with you, when you claim it's a way out or ordinary, to do what I've prefixed to do. But... Yes, if you don't mind, I won't. Until you are safe again, I will stay with you as much as you want, and as much as it's possible for me. Of course, during all the days I will be going to attend Okinomiya's school I won't be able to fulfill my task, so don't forget this."

Rena scanned him again, with a perplexed face. He really seemed a stubborn boy, that kind of upright person that never changes his intentions. She would have never been able to persuade him not to feel in debt to her.

"Ah, another thing." asked Hanyuu, suddenly "What were you taking from your pocket, before that trunk... Hauu, you know what I mean, hauuu..."

"Oh, I imagine you're referring to this." He looked for something, and after a moment he showed a little handkerchief. "My glasses were slightly steamy, air in this zone is quite wet, especially inside woods... And I couldn't see her very well. That was the reason I asked for her full name, before, I could only catch a glimpse of a girl, but I couldn't realize her identity. Anyways, before talking with her, I wanted to have perfectly cleaned lenses, even to make sure to see her correctly, and have a proper dialogue with her."

"A... proper... dialogue?" asked Rena, puzzled. He was really a strange boy. Politeness and good manners had to be fundamental, for him, even if that meant becoming a few comic. But, in the end, she didn't dislike his character, at all. Without being able to stop herself, she burst into a fit of laughter, for the first time in her whole life.

Then, under the others' amused eyes, she smiled sincerely, and she asked him to join them during the weekend, which was about to start.


	33. Fragments of kakera

**33 – ********Fragments of kakera**

_Okinomiya, 22nd January 1984_

"Wow, don't you agree with me? They are marvelous!"

The girls of the club were standing in front of the window of one of the most famous shops in the whole Okinomiya. They were not the first women who spent hours in that point; on the contrary, it was a common scene. After all, the shop they were admiring sold wedding gowns.

"These dresses come from Occident, I'd say" commented Alice "Or at least their style is a Western one. I didn't know Japaneses were so fond of them. I imagined you all followed your traditions."

"It's not so" answered Shion "This white veil and this long train always inspires a certain charm. Why should we wear only that sort of heavy hood, instead? In summer it keeps too warm, and you neither see anything."

"It's not fair to say that." replied Daijiro, who was the only boy of that company, that afternoon, and who had to carry all the packages resulting from their shopping. "In the past centuries our women have always used that kind of dress. Probably it's because they found it was a wonderful dress, in spite of what you are arguing."

"_In spite of what you are arguing..._ why don't you decide to speak normally, Daijiro-kun?" she exclaimed, annoyed, while Rena was laughing, amused by the scene.

"However" continued Alice "I can't understand how could you wear a western wedding gown. I want to say, that should be reserved for Christian rites, and I guess none of you belongs to this religion, am I right?"

"Oh, no, no. It's not necessary, instead, Rena knows it. It's enough to attend a ceremony following the Protestant rite." explained Rena "And you are allowed to wear it anyhow, even if you are Shintoist, for example."

"Huh? Does it really work so?"

Rena nodded. "Dad has designed and sold a lot of wedding dresses during all these years, he has told me about this. It may be a bit strange, from your point of view, but there's nothing bad about it, there is."

"N-no, it's not that I mind about this. If you like to do that, there's no reason to do it in a different way... I only thought it was a bit... unusual."

"Tsk" commented Shion "When I was in the Academy, I had to attend dozens and dozens of marriages, with my schoolmates... And they all wore that kind of dress. Those women loved that kind of rite, they thought it was the most beautiful one. That must be the strength of the charm provoked by exotic manners, and I imagine that it's becoming a very common usage, now. When Mom had to get married, instead... Ah, the Old Good Times. Do you remember what we have been told, Onee?"

Mion looked neither to have heard her. She was going on fixing her gaze on the window, without turning her head at her sister. Shion called for her another time, and finally the pony-tailed girl seemed to return to their same world.

"What... what were you saying, Shion?" she asked.

Shion sighed, and she answered: "I was asking if you were still keeping in mind our mother's tale, the one about her marriage."

"Oh, that one..." she said, absently "Yes, I remember..."

"Had it been interesting?" asked Alice "What had happened?"

"Well..." explained Rena, who had been told the story directly by Oryou, when she was still alive "She had fallen in love with an outsider Yakuza boss, years ago. Nobody inside the family had selected him, and nobody had approved their relationship. But Akane-san had rebelled against that decision, even if that choice meant fighting against her own mother. They even had a great sword fight, can you imagine that? Like the ones inside movies, like them. And Akane-san was even able to win, so she had been allowed to decide about her life autonomously, under the condition not to be the heiress of the clan, anymore."

"Oh, I see... that's why Akane-san is not the ruler of the family... I wondered about it so many times, without finding an answer..."

"And now you know that" replied Shion, grinning "The following day she was wearing that white wedding dress... a traditional one, indeed, like the one of her mother, after all. There are a lot of photos about that day, I can show you if you want to."

"It would be nice. I'd like to attend a Japanese marriage, one day. It must be interesting. In the end, that's the strength of the charm provoked by exotic manners, as you have just said..."

"Oh, you'll see it, I hope. It's a wonderful event, as it is everywhere." exclaimed Hanyuu. She still remembered the day when she got married, centuries ago. It had occurred in a far past, so it had been very traditional wedding day, probably very similar to Oryou's and Akane's ones. Despite her horns and her demonic nature, it had been a very normal human celebration, like thousands of others, and like the one she wanted it to be.

However, they were talking about the next ones, so Shion mumbled about its possible protagonists: "A future marriage? Hmmm, and who would be the lucky ones? Maybe it's going to be Onee's one, don't you think it would be nice?"

Mion didn't answer to Shion's defiance. Her sister was trying to involve her in their dialogue, but she really looked like a ghost in the middle of them. Shion lost her smile, she was trying to make her spending some normal and quiet day, in the end they went to Okinomiya because of that. Forgetting about the JOST, Rena's problems... But that renouncing attitude from her was disarming. Moreover, it wasn't either funny, harassing her in that way, without a reaction from her. Also Rika looked at her, thoughtful. She was getting more and more similar to Takano, somehow. So... was her irrecoverable, like the other one? But Takano's nature was so different from Mion's one... Takano was a quiet woman who had had recourse mostly to her brain, and to her smartness. Mion, instead, was used to be a girl full of energy, who didn't hesitate to avail of her physical presence... They were the opposite, so how could their end be so similar?

Alice tried to make the atmosphere more serene, claiming: "I-I see... However, I can't see why you like all those heavy and uncomfortable dresses... Hooks, or veils... Tsk. I'd rather wear a pantsuit, or something of that sort. You could walk without risking to stumble, at least. But it's a real pity that you can't wear them, if you want to get married inside a church and it falls to your lot to be the bride."

"Oh, very nice, typical of your cynic lack of feelings. And where would the romanticism be, if you behave in that way?" commented Shion, ironically, trying to give her a hand to raise Mion's mood with a joyful debate.

"Thank you for defining me cynical... And moreover, romanticism? Forcing the girl you love to wear that giant mass of white tissues... you dare calling it romanticism? Veils blocking out your view, ankle-breakers stilettos, endless train destined to get dirty... Surviving to such a torture would be a valuable achievement, absolutely. I know that having a family is a continue fight, but at least make the first day of living together pleasant!"

"You and your absurd way to see things... Why don't you just think about the beauty of such an event, once settled properly? You mustn't see it only in a prosy way. You do it as sign of love, as an extraordinary day you want to remember for the rest of your life. Who cares about the hindrance caused by the dress, if you can feel like a princess, for one day?"

"Oh, sure... One day you are a princess, and the day after you are maybe your husband's servant! God save the Coherence... It's much better to make everything immediately clear, rather. I'd prefer having a respectful husband and a humble ceremony, rather than this."

"And why shouldn't you have a respectful husband _and _a great ceremony, instead? The former doesn't exclude necessarily the latter, don't you think so?"

"Pfff, you're talking as if the squaring of the circle would be possible, now. There _must _be something going wrong, so I'm choosing the lesser evil."

"But at least try to realize this damn squaring, don't you agree? Don't renounce to something without attempting..."

"Rena thinks both of you are wrong, she thinks."

The other two girls stopped quarreling, and turned at the brown-haired girl "Oh? What do you mean, Rena?"

"Well... Rena thinks... Rena thinks that she shouldn't get married. She would be happier, so."

Neither of them understood what she meant, in the beginning. Then Shion, thinking back at her friend's background, got an idea: "You are saying... you wouldn't like a rite at all, aren't you?"

Rena nodded, melancholically: "Doing a ceremony, doing whichever ceremony, I mean... It would be a sign that you want to live with your partner forever. It shows this wish by you, in my opinion. But why are you claiming this? Do you really need that kind of rite, to prove it? Isn't your word enough?"

She was thinking about her family, and her look got gradually sadder: "When you decide you want to leave your husband, or your wife, it's because you don't want to stay with him, or with her, anymore. You start hating who you had declared to desire to love forever. So why have you got married with your partner? Maybe the other really trusted you, maybe he believed in your words. You have betrayed him, in this way. So isn't much better to live together with no official rites, or official declarations? A separation would be much less painful, then. It would reflect the desire not to be a hypocrite, after all. Rena hates people who change their mind so easily."

Rena was not smiling, while spelling these last words. But Hanyuu was next to her, now, willing to relieve her: "Hauu Hauu... Rena-san, I can understand how you're feeling, and I could claim I've shared them, some time ago. But being coherent for all your live, never changing your ideas, as well as your opinions... this is not always possible."

The brown-haired girl glanced at her, while she continued: "There are moments in your life when you realize that what you think about something or somebody is not right. Maybe you thought it as a better person than what he is in reality, but also the opposite can happen, maybe you suddenly find out he's not the evil one you guessed. What should you do, in those cases? Never changing your mind? You would hurt the others, or you, depending on the situation... For me, this is something which belongs to a mummy, not to a human being."

"And what would Dad have done, to deserve my mother's betrayal?" she asked, with a shroud of anger in her words.

"You were thinking about that, as I imagined." Hanyuu bent her head down, thinking about what to say. _The best answer would be explaining that guilt hardly ever belongs to only one of the two sides... Rena's father must have done something that her mother had disliked, and that had pushed her towards her new partner... Maybe was she only a flighty woman, instead? But why has he married that kind of person, then? Could Rena grow up with this wonderful and strong nature, next to a scared man and an arrogant woman? And could she love such a woman, could she even admire her when she was little, changing her mind only after having discovered her new relationship? That would be strange. Ibaraki had changed her mother, I suppose... but it wouldn't be strange if it had been just the same with her father. He might have had a role in that story, if that's the case. In the end, we know something about her whole story, but we don't know everything, to tell it with Rika's words. But Rena hasn't ignored that part. She has decided to ignore it, defending him as if he was just an innocent victim. So, would I offend her, if I reveal her my real opinion?_

Somebody suddenly spoke, answering to Rena instead of her. It was Daijiro: "The matter is not whether it's fine to changing idea, or not, in my humble opinion. When you get married, through every possible ceremony, you make a promise. You are giving your own word that you are going to live together with your partner, forever. And breaking this promise, reneging your word, is a horrible sin. They have always taught me to stand by what I say, and I am happy to have been educated in this way. Maybe my parents and my grandparents lived in a world different from this, but I'd dislike to change due to this truth. So I agree with Rena. I don't mind if the woman I will fall in love prefers not to get married with me with a formal rite. Her word and her authentic wish will be enough, for me."

Nobody answered, respecting his view of the world. Rena, instead, hinted a smile at him, and she spoke softly just a _Thank you, _with a little effort.

…

Always in Okinomiya, but in another zone of the city, Satoshi and Keiichi were starting to get ready. The match between the Hinamizawa Fighters and the Takatsudo Devils was about to start. Since they played in Okinomiya, because in Takatsudo there were no regular baseball fields, the two boys had to go to the city and join the team, which needed two further players to be complete, that time. Not far from them, Satoko was scanning them, as reserve player and substitute of Irie, who couldn't come to Okinomiya. She was the only girl of the club who hadn't gone with the others. In the end, she hated going shopping, and she felt alike more useful, there.

After having dressed the uniform of the team, they sit on the bench, to have lunch. Midday had passed not a long time ago, and they needed to be at the height of their power, in order to carry their mates to a new stunning victory. So, Satoko gave to each of them a bento, before bailing out hers, and sitting on the coffer of a car parked next to the bench. Those boxes full of food had been lovingly prepared by Shion, who had remembered that Keiichi didn't know how to cook, and that her mother would have been far from Hinamizawa with her husband for the whole day, which meant she couldn't attend to prepare a meal for him.

On Satoshi's one Shion had written his name, as well as on Keiichi's one. So Satoko knew which box she had to give to both of them... Was it normal? The food inside it looked just the same, that distinction had no reason to exist, at a first glance. Then, Keiichi got suspicious. He raised his box, and he looked under it. There was a little note, written on a piece of paper stuck on the metal:

_WARNING! __In case of accidental ingestion, consult a__ physician._

He grinned nervously, while reading those words. "Oh" he exclaimed then, bothered "Very very very funny, considering that I should actually ingest it all..."

"What are you saying, stupid villain... It's just an innocent joke, there is no poison inside it." Satoko grinned "At least I don't think so, to be honest Nee-Nee hadn't told me if that food is effectively reliable, or not, when she has given me the bentos."

"O-oh, t-thank you..." with a grain of strain, Keiichi swallowed the first morsel, and, after realizing he was still alive, he went on with the second one, and so on.

He finished eating before Satoshi, so he had to wait for him to do the same. Then, they gave the empty boxes back to Satoko, who pushed them in a plastic bag. Then they took a bat, and they started their warm up exercises.

"So, what happens, if we win this match?" asked Satoshi.

"Well, if Irie-sensei was not wrong we should grab the second place of the league table. Being the runner-up would be a very great result, because we would be invited for the final match, against the Titans."

"And if we win the Finals, what will happen?"

"I don't know... But I suppose that the answer is simply _Nothing._ This is just a local tournament, they haven't settled anything for the post season, I guess."

"It's a pity... I would have liked that we could take part in the Koshien."

"The National High School Baseball Championship, you mean? I fear that we will never reach it... We are too little teams, there are hundreds of lineups stronger than us."

"Yes, you're right... I've started playing baseball too late, in my life. I would have been by far a better player."

"You'd have liked to move a bat since you were a little child, then?"

"Now that I am so fond of it, yes... Now those goals are too far to achieve." He exclaimed, while rotating the hips.

"Maybe it's not too late, instead."

"Yes and no. To join the major championships, the MLB... it's impossible. But why shouldn't consider a minor league, for example? I could shoot to fame, there."

"Do you think you could earn your living so? It won't be easy."

"But it's possible. And, you know, there are not many other things I'm good at. I don't pretend to make my pile, I would be happy to live honestly with what they will give me. Living with Satoko, and Shion, I want to say..." he blushed a few, while finished speaking.

"But taking that choice would mean leaving Hinamizawa, then."

Satoshi stopped swinging his bat for a moment.

"Yes, it would be the nastiest consequence of this decision. But I can still live here, and moving only for the trainings, or the matches. There are a couple of teams in cities not far from Hinamizawa, you know. I would go for them, first."

"A life as commuter, then? It wouldn't be easy."

"I would spend quite a lot of time far from the village, but I would stay there in other periods. In this way Shion and Satoko wouldn't have to leave their friends and relatives, moreover. I have thought a lot about my future, in these days. Once everything is right again, I will follow my path."

Not having always to worry about Satoko and his uncles had changed Satoshi's behavior. He could start to think about himself too, and this wasn't a bad thing, in the end. In the past he had disregarded his own health, but now he seemed more self-confident. Its attitude had fairly improved.

Keiichi looked at the baseball field, noticing their teammates were looking for them. He smiled, glad to observe that new strength coming from his friend's words, and while lacing his shoes he exclaimed: "Well. We'll see..."

…

Irie couldn't be at the baseball field, while his players were trying to obtain that hard-fought victory. He had to stay in Hinamizawa, at the Clinic, to watch over Takano.

Miyo, in the beginning, had to be sent to prison, after having been arrested by the Banken unit. She had to be judged by a commission created for that purpose, officially, but they all were sure that, once she had been left alone, they would have found a way to kill her, in order to avoid some dangerous secrets to be revealed. Irie, together with Tomitake, couldn't allow it. So, he declared that Takano suffered from the final level of the Hinamizawa Syndrome, and that the disciplinary committee would have been allowed to handle her case only after her return to a stable state of health.

They weren't lying, after all. Takano's neck was full of marks, caused by her ungovernable instinct to claw her own throat. If they hadn't blocked her, she would have committed suicide, without either needing the gun Okonogi had handed to her. She wouldn't have survived, with no intensive cures. Hence she had been brought back to the Clinic, and from that moment she hadn't left Hinamizawa anymore, excluding some day when something special happened, like the one when all the village had gone and protested in front of the Prefecture, due to the Landslide Affair.

Was she safe, there? Tomitake couldn't stay with her for so much time as he wanted to. His job issues hardly let him have a moment of relax, to spend with the one he considered his girlfriend. As a matter of fact, he had never declared his feelings towards her, but, by seeing how she behaved in the rare afternoons they were together, he could conclude that he was someone special for her, too. He had only to wait for her to recover completely, and in the meanwhile he would have continued being concerned about his counterintelligence affairs. They were extemporary jobs related to his past specialization, like collaborating at the realizations of new weapons suitable for snipers, and so on. Things which took nearly all his day but which allowed him to earn a decent amount of money, to use afterwards, for his future life with Takano.

Paradoxically, he had to stay far from Takano, the woman he loved. Working in the counterintelligence was necessary, because in this way he could get some grain of information about how the _Tokyo_ organization was handling Takano's case. Only voices, naturally, there was nothing whose authenticity could be really checked. But at least they weren't bad news. The two factions inside the group seemed still involved in a huge fight, for the control of the organization. But they were using as excuse some other problem. They were arguing about a certain island in the Pacific Ocean, where something strange had sounded to be happened, but there were no data about what had occurred there. Tomitake was not interested in the details, but he was happy to know that Takano seemed to have been forgotten. Rather, her death could at most have been used by the Koizumi faction, to make the other one lose its power: since Koizumi's adversaries were the ones who opposed the Alphabet Project, they would have been accused of Miyo's eventual death, charged of being cruel and not forgiving harmless people who had worked in the past for the wrong side of the organization, without having ever hurt them. They would have stood in an embarrassing situation, indeed. But since Koizumi had been a friend of Takano's grandfather since the World War II, Tomitake was sure that his party wouldn't have ever harmed her, even if Koizumi himself had died three years before. For that genre of people, with strong bonds with the Yakuza, money is important, but honor is even more, and killing the woman their old chief was protecting would have been a terrible shame.

The only risk she ran had been the arrival of a sort of spy. If the indiscretions heard by Tomitake were to be believed, someone would have come to the Clinic to check if Takano could be dangerous for the organization, without being noticed. Had he been sent... by who? By someone who likely knew where Tomitake worked. If he was still interested in Hinamizawa, he was probably aware that Tomitake would have discovered that plan, in a way. So the only possible answer to that remark was that someone related to Koizumi had sent him there deliberately, just to make the others calm. An act required by the common procedure, settled to end this story once for all, as if his senders had just wanted to rescue her. That spy would have explained that Miyo was now unable to harm them, which was the truth as a matter of fact, and they would have forgotten everything about her, engaged by other internal fights. And it had ended effectively in this way. Observed with a light shroud of tenseness by Irie, that unknown man had arrived a day under an alias, and after a short tour he had gone away, and he had never come back. Everything had run fine, and even if he wouldn't have ever met him, Tomitake had thanked Koizumi, inside himself.

Now Takano's body was safe, and no bodyguards were required for her sake anymore. But what about her soul? Her boyfriend had to live far from her, and she had nothing to do, in particular, outside work. She used to spent a lot of afternoons and evenings walking through the village, meeting the others, meeting the elderly people, meeting the little kids, meeting the workers, meeting the boys and girls of the club. More than once she had met Keiichi, and Mion, and Rena, and all the others, while pestering and teasing each other. But she had met them also in other situations: once, when Mion and Keiichi were alone, she had saw them blushing... they seemed about to get engaged soon, that day.

But in spite of all those pleasant encounters, she couldn't do without feeling alike a foreign body. The people she was living among were the one she had desired to kill, in the end. Yes, she didn't consider them like Guinea pigs anymore, or like mere material for her experiments and her research. But she still thought she was indissolubly different from them. Why was she there, in the end? She was there because she had no choice. She would have died, outside Hinamizawa and the countryside around it. But she didn't consider herself like a real inhabitants of the village, rather she was like a prisoner. She thought not to have anything in common with them, with those simple minds.

And she couldn't avoid reasoning so, in spite of what had happened to her. That summer, when she had fought and lost, in those dark woods... She had seen Oyashiro-sama, another time. A little girl who, after the end of the battle, had invited her to stay in the village, promising her that she would have been accepted by the others, and that she would have spent a happier life. But how could she hope so? That atmosphere, in the forest, was so similar to the one when she had escaped from the orphanage. Trees everywhere, absence of light, an endless and tormenting rain which hit her head, merciless. It reminded her too many bad memories, to inspire in her heart a real feeling of relieve. When she had been captured by the Banken, she had started to cry. But hers were tears of desperation, not of solace.

And in fact, in the following period she didn't set up a real relationship with the rest of the village. She was used to walk alone, lost in her thoughts. And the Syndrome was not the only responsible for it, despite all the marks the Banken soldiers had found on her neck. There were deeper reasons for it. During all those years, she had thrown herself into her grandfather's research heart and soul, and she had no further aims to get. Tomitake was near to her, and he was becoming a presence more and more pleasant, from day to day, but she had never lost sight of her primary purpose. She was even going to sacrifice his life for those studies, when she had captured him and brought him to the Yamainu Headquarters. Her grandpa's work came before everything, and she wouldn't have minded to die, after having been able to show to everyone he was right.

Now, instead, what was she supposed to do? Just assisting Irie-sensei at the Clinic? Every dumb nurse just come out from school could do that, why had she studied so hard for such a humble role, then? The truth was that she hadn't anything to do. When Irie asked her to help him, she usually obeyed, but without enthusiasm, and without smiling. She wasn't that used to be so extrovert either before, excluding some rare occasions, but her state of isolation was getting stricter and stricter, progressively.

Could she be helped by the drug Irie was about to complete? Perhaps. The most recent tests Irie had performed still showed that she was suffering from the third or fourth level of the disease, and those parasites surely didn't help her. But her blood type was A-, so, unlike Satoshi, she couldn't be healed with the transfusion of a little quantity of Mion's blood. However, it wouldn't have been enough, anyways. Now that the _Tokyo_ didn't look to search for her, Tomitake would have better gone for her much more often, but at the moment he was forced to work for the counterintelligence at least until the end of 1984, by contract. Leaving them earlier was impossible, for now, it would have created a long series of problems to him and to the others, he might have been even charged to be a spy, somehow.

Takano really looked destined to stay alone for a further while, therefore. Her most inner feelings would have never revealed outside, having nobody next to her, and this wasn't a good thing at all.

…

Somewhere in a big city of Japan, during an icy night, a luxurious car driven by a chauffeur was waiting for someone. It had been there for quite a long time, but fortunately the driver's waiting was about to finish. From the wound up window, he could catch a glimpse at the grey-haired woman who was approaching the car, with a slow gait.

The woman looked perplexed, and worried. _I don't understand, why Tawanabe has run away in that way from the association? His betrayal won't stay unpunished, but now I have other things to care about. Too many people on our side are scared, now, and the old Koizumi's party is still on our case, but I can't see the reason. Scared by what, moreover? To die? Please don't kid me, we have faced much more serious issues, and there are amounts of money which can make them change their mind, no matter how well founded their fears are. Even if Okinawa's affair had been a real disaster, and now our position is getting worse, __with every day that goes by__. If I don't act quickly, we are going to be out of play before than what we can imagine. I have to think about the solution, but now I am so tired, I'd need a rest. I will find out something tomorrow morning._

She sat down on the rear seat, and she asked the drive to bring her to home. After having heard the engine while being turned on, and after having perceived that the chauffeur was starting to slip the car into gear, she lowered the little sun visor present also above the seat she was on. There was a mirror stuck on it, and she wanted to check her look for a moment, she had the doubt that the businessman she had just met had got a bad impression because of something wrong on her face, and she wanted to have both of her hands free to put herself in order more quickly.

But, suddenly, a bad surprised blocked her. Next to the mirror, someone had place a little piece of paper. On it, they had written only a handful of words:

_Good night, Nomura-san._

_Nomura-san?_ She scanned that line, frozen in a cold sweat. Why were they calling her in that way? That name didn't sound new to her, but she had used that alias only once, during that issue with that little village... How was it named... Well, it didn't matter. She had run a lot of risks, during her life, and a lot of people had menaced her, for the most various reasons. She exactly knew what that message really meant. Regardless that the car was now traveling at a normal speed, she threw herself towards the handle of the car door, looking desperately for a way out.

It was too late. A giant explosion was heard in all the houses and buildings next to the road, and hundreds of eyes arrived soon to look at the high flames which were devouring the car, and the ones inside. Among them, there were two which were carefully observing the scene, controlling everything with a particular interest. Those two cool and lifeless eyes were making sure that nothing had remained of the woman once known as Nomura.


	34. TIP: Forgotten Worlds V

******TIP: Forgotten Worlds V**

"I don't give a damn if that retarded has fallen off a veranda from her hideout! Search for Rika, I want her here right now, dead or alive!"  
Takano was out of control. The most recent pieces of news reported that Sonozaki Shion, wanted by the police as the main suspect of the serial murders, had died before been captured, probably committing suicide. But this was the least of Takano's problems, now. What could she do, excluding looking for Rika's corpse? She had to establish absolutely the exact hour of the little girl's death. What if she had passed away days ago, as the preliminary paperwork claimed? Their contacts at the police station had gathered some shreds of info, and they had been told that the murder probably dated back to a week before, nearly.

_A week ago... No, it's not true, it's not true, it's not true, it's not true... _Takano repeated softly, petrified by that possibility. She looked at the electronic calendar on the wall. It was the first day of July, so Rika had died during a period lasting from the 22nd to the 25th of June. Yes, in fact she hadn't met her since the Watanagashi festival, she had to hide herself. She had used the corpse of another woman, to pretend to be dead, and to be allowed to act undisturbed. But now this strategy was becoming a double-edge sword. She couldn't oversee the whole situation as she wished, and she could perceive that something was going wrong.

Something else, besides the behavior of the Syndrome, more exactly. If Rika had been died for so much time, the other villagers should have begun to act violently, upset because of the parasites inside their brain. They had to be out of control. They _had to be _out of control. Instead... nothing. She could spy what happened in the clinic, and nothing strange was there. It was enough to look at Irie, to have a confirm: he was so stupidly sorry for what had occurred to all those youngsters, but he wasn't under stress. He hadn't to face the last symptoms of the disease.

She had to know. She had to know, it was a matter of life or death. She had spent the whole morning panting and reeling, not stopping to look for news which might overturn the whole situation, and show that her Grandpa was right. But she couldn't stand motionless forever. Frantically gone down to the hidden basement of the Clinic, she asked for Okonogi, after having checked that Irie was not there. She had to examine Rika's body, in a way or in another. So, once the man had appeared in front of her, she immediately asked him to help her to reach the mortuary inside the Police Station in Okinomiya, no matter how much the operation was risky. She didn't accept to listen to any remark or objection, and in the end Okonogi limited himself to sigh and nod, and then to give precise orders for the necessary things to arrange.

Then, some minute later, Takano, Okonogi and other three soldiers got in a little van, and during the trip nobody spoke, which allowed the woman to reflect about the situation.

She thought about what she knew about the story. Rika had officially disappeared on the 22nd of June, since she had been seen by other people in the previous days. Also Satoko had been missing since that date, and indeed her corpse had been found in the Sonozaki Manor, not far from her little friend's one. What had happened, during those eight-nine days? Why the police hadn't look for them carefully, inside that building? As far as she knew, Keiichi and Rena had been attacked in the Manor, the day after Rika's disappearance. Once they had discovered that somebody had attempted to kill the two of them, it was quite obvious to conclude that the two girls had been killed there, and not in another place. The Sonozakis' house was quite a huge building, she admitted it, but doing such a mistake was a serious non-fulfillment of their work, by the police. In the beginning, they hadn't made either a decent house search, in that Manor...

It was true that neither Keiichi nor Rena had collaborated. They had admitted that their friend had tried to harm him, they couldn't deny it. Rena had to tell the truth, to make the police burst into that sort of torture hall. But they hadn't added anything else, after that day. Keiichi was still at the hospital, and Rena was at her house, with her father. Irie had invited them at the clinic, in the end of June, to check their frame of mind, so she could observe them from a secret peephole... They were no more alive. Namely, their bodies still moved, but that experience had marked their souls for the rest of their life. Their gestures looked nearly done mechanically, due to habit and not to their real will. They didn't care about what was happening around them, anymore.

_And in spite of this, they still pretended that Rika and Satoko were alive? They hadn't told anything to anyone about it... Were they oblivious, before yesterday? They knew nothing? That's just impossible, their friends are what they care more, they had to be worried about them ..._ Takano didn't understand why they were protecting a girl who had tried to kill Keiichi twice. She can't be still their friend, can she? How could they forgive her another time?

Takano raised her eyes, and she stared at Okonogi, who was driving and who didn't reciprocate the glance, looking only straight in front of him. So, she observed the country road the van was following. She didn't remember to have ever gone along that way. _Where are we going? We won't reach Okinomiya, if we..._

The van stopped. They were far from Okinomiya, far from Hinamizawa, far from each building built on that cursed zone of the country. Okonogi observed her coldly, and he ordered her: "Please get out of here, Major."

"Why should I..." One of the soldiers didn't wait for an answer. He grabbed her by a hand, and she pulled her to the road, making her fall to the ground. The four men were now staring at her, intimidating, and the three soldiers were carrying each a little submachine gun.

Takano stood up, still bewildered, and she asked: "What's the meaning of this, Okonogi?"

"Oh, haven't you understood yet? This story about the Syndrome, about the sudden death of the whole population... it's just a farce."

"DON'T DARE DESECRATING MY GRANDPA'S STUDIES! DON'T YOU..."

"Why don't you explain me what has happened there, so? Everybody looks fine, despite what you had been declaring during all this time."

"I... I don't..."

"You probably are not aware of this, but we already knew about the Queen's death. We had known since... the 25th, or thereabouts, just like the police. So, since we hadn't time enough to perform the Emergency Manual, we have made a little experiment. We have just waited for the development of the situation. And we have seen it's still fine. No craziness, no further murders, nothing whatsoever. You know, Nomura-san from Tokyo, and a lot of people... they are so disappointed because of you."

"So you've lied to me! To your Major! You had ensured me that Rika was still alive, until today!"

"It has no importance. We just have modified some of the pieces of information you were given, only to keep you calm for the amount time necessary for our test. After all, you were always secluded in those locked rooms, there was no chance you could discover the truth. And finally we have done nothing different from what you have. You have lied to us, with that fairy story about those parasites... and we've done the same, now."

Takano gnashed her teeth: "It's impossible, I've said! What Grandpa had written on these scrapbooks... it can't be false! Just wait another couple of days and..."

"Well, if you don't trust us, you can always join the rest of the village... Oh, sure, you can't, you wished to look dead, with that little trick... But I think it would be interesting if they see you again... _Hadn't you been killed? How can you be still here?... _It would be so funny."

"You little ba..."

"Oh, I am not so little, as you can notice, Major." he replied, seizing the notebooks Takano was still holding, and throwing them away. The woman looked at them while they were flying, and she tried to run to pick them up, but an arm blocked her.

"What... what do you want to do..."

"Can't you guess it? Irie-sensei will be downgraded, and sent to somewhere in Japan, to some place where this shame will pursue him as well as he lives. After all, he has failed too, and he won't have time to study the disease anymore, since all those theories about the Queen Carrier turned out to be humbugs for babies. But in the end he was only a scapegoat, and he doesn't know anything which could be dangerous for someone, so his life will be spared. They haven't decided it yet, but maybe he will be allowed even to take that boy still in a deep coma, to try to heal him somehow... But I don't think it will be ever possible, with no money and no adequate means... What will he be able to discover, about this damn Syndrome? Tsk, that boy is already condemned to die without either seeing sunlight, and Irie-sensei will never forgive himself for this unavoidable fate... Oh, well, whatever. What I know for sure is that the situation is completely different for you, Major..."

The truth finally appeared inside Takano's mind.

"So how... how are you going to kill me?" she said, coldly looking to the ground full of sheets of paper "With those guns, like a mere criminal?"

"Yes... but we have to make your corpse disappear, what a nuisance. But I already know how to settle it. Do you remember that you wanted to make the other believe that your body had been burned, don't you?"

"I see..."

"Well, we'll make sure that your real body will never be found. Two Takanos would be a very annoying matter. So, have you a last wish? Some last word to spell?"

Takano shook her head, so the soldiers raised their weapons, aiming at her. But in the end, those submachine guns were not necessary. Takano had closed her eyes, locked by a film of tears. Grandpa was wrong, in the end, and all his work, which had been her reason to live until that moment, had been useless. Her hard study had been useless, her efforts had been useless. Her whole life had been useless. Oyashiro-sama had defeated her. In her mind, she thought that she hadn't been able to defeat Him, to replace Him as Hinamizawa's god. She had failed. She was a failure.

The threes soldiers in front of her moved their fingers to push the trigger, but in the end Takano was already dead.

* * *

**Author's note: This is a sort of aftermath of Watanagashi-hen/Meakashi-hen. Since the Great Hinamizawa Disaster _does not _occur in these worlds (you can find easily the credit roll of them in the Internet, most of the minor characters survives after 1983), I imagined how Takano could have reacted to such a scenario, and about what happened to her. Personally I think this little chapter is just a sketch, but it would be interesting to read some good development of it, this part has been "forgotten" by the main story, but it can present a lot of interesting situations (of course, if you're looking for some idea and you like this, you can do it yourself, with your next fanfiction...)**

**But does this story mean that the claimed catastrophe caused by the Syndrome is just a farce? Well... it seems so, if you look at what happens in the original story, honestly. But in the end Rika can't know it, she dies before she can discover it...  
**


	35. Playing with fire

**35 – Playing with fire**

_Hinamizawa, 4th February 1984_

"I don't understand why we have to go with them..."

Keiichi felt uncomfortably, when by phone he was told that the whole group had to go to the Prefecture, the following morning. The last time they had gone there all together had been very shattering, a lot of things had occurred, and not all of them had been pleasant. But it was his duty not to leave the others alone, and the matter sounded important, since his presence had been requested too, so he answered he would have joined them. So, after the usual final greetings, he hung up the receiver, and he asked her mother for some advice.

"Mom, in your opinion... is this story going to end, one day?"

Maebara Aiko observed her son, with a sad look. His question made a sense, in the end they had brought him to Hinamizawa to let him live a calmer life, far from the stress he was breathing in Tokyo. But now they were facing a matter who didn't look to intend to finish, and it was a bit enervating. Keiichi wouldn't have ever left his friends alone, but his raising doubts were understandable. So, the woman took some second to think about the best answer to say, then she started to explain: "Keiichi, you have read my crime novel, once, haven't you? The one I had written for the novel contest."

"Yes... but what has that to do with us, now?"

"When I had sent them to the ones who had to judge it, I prayed them to give me a short review by them, through a letter of reply. I just wanted to know their impressions, where I had to improve in their opinion. There are not a lot of people who read works by an unknown author, and having a guideline by some expert might have been useful. Do you know what they wrote?"

"No."

"That the plot itself was a good one, with nice and unexpected twists, and a not banal end. But the protagonists seemed made of papier-mache. They weren't real. As the story proceeded, they often behaved as if they had forgotten what the others had done to them, and in the very end, in the epilogue, some of them acted as nothing had occurred. The past events hadn't had any effects on them."

"That was just their point of view, it's not said to be true."

"Well, you're right, but their opinion is more significant than mine, or yours. They may be wrong, indeed, but it's less probable than its opposite, don't you think so? I like detective stories so much, but I am not fond of the side stories, of the other elements of a novel. Even a crime novel must have a little psychological side, something about the various characters which makes the result agreeable, but I was not good at arranging it. I couldn't wait writing the parts I loved more, and I realized the other ones hastily, without being careful to describe my creatures in a decent way. My characters were so similar to each other, with no background at all, with no definite nature, that was why they disliked my work. Thinking about the tricks arranged by the culprit had been my main effort, but the culprit himself could have been even a monkey, or a computer with no feelings, nobody would have noticed the difference." Aiko sighed, sadly smiling towards the floor. Then she looked at her son in the face, and she added: "Well, I'm rambling, now. Let's get back to the point."

"What I mean, Keiichi, is that there are problems which are never resolved, in real life. People who go on hating each other for all their life, and who wouldn't hesitate to harm their enemy each time they can. Should this mean that you have to guard yourself forever, without doing anything else? Surely no. There are other things you necessarily take care of, and you can't forget them. But you can also have fun with your friends, even if there is someone you can't stand, somewhere. It's normal not to look sympathetic to everyone. So my suggestion is to give to this story the right importance: be careful when you hear their name, but don't spend each second of your day thinking about them."

"So you're advising me to live together with this sensation?"

"At the moment, yes. Do what you have done until now. Take care of your friends, but feel yourself allowed to go to play baseball, sometimes, or to do shopping with someone else, or whatever you please. Don't be negligent, but don't let the fear dominate you. However, I don't think this story will lasts forever. Money is the Lady of this world, unfortunately, and waiting too much time costs. If nothing happens in the very next period... well, it will be the sign nothing will ever happen, in my opinion. Hang in there for a few months, and everything will run fine."

…

Aiko was right, but not in the way she liked to. The following day, when Keiichi joined the others at the Prefecture, he immediately noticed the aura of anxiety which was surrounding his friends. And it was not due to the weather present in that afternoon. It was a cold Sunday, indeed, but like many others in the period, after all. Nor the cause was the fact they had to go immediately back to Hinamizawa, to the Manor of the Sonozaki family, in spite of having just arrived to Okinomiya's prefecture. So he got in one of the cars, together with Shion, the Houjous and Kasai, and once they left he asked Shion for the reason of this change of schedule.

"They have asked for Onee's presence at the Manor, with urgency." she answered, and she added nothing else. Keiichi, worried, endeavored to ask her for more details, but Shion shook her head, replying she knew as much as him about that story. In the last period her sister was speaking less and less with the others, and even in that occasion she only told her they had to go back home, without explaining why. She would have looked for her mother, once returned, since she had been the one who had phoned to Mion. She was informed for sure, and she would have explained them what was happening.

The trip from the Prefecture to the Manor lasted nearly half an hour, and no words were heard during the travel. Nobody spoke, nobody wished to, after all. Keiichi wasn't there to make sure of it, but he guessed that it was the same in the other cars, too, and probably he was right. They didn't understand what the matter was, and they couldn't wait to arrive, and discover it. The fear of the Unknown was wrenching their hearts.

When they were about to arrive, a first surprise shocked them. Anywhere near the door of the Manor, a lot of cars had been parked. And most of all were limousines, or anyways luxury cars. Got out of her car, Shion ran towards them, being able to recognize some of them: "This is the car of Uncle Yoshiro, and that one belongs to the great-aunt... Why... Why are they here? We didn't expect anyone to visit us, today, Mom hasn't told me anything about it. So why..."

"We should go in." suggested Satoshi "Mion-san is already inside, and we will be told about everything, once inside your house."

Shion nodded, and she quickly ran to the Manor, opening roughly the entrance door. Her feverish run was stopped by her mother, who was waiting for them, and who asked her not to make any noise, in order to follow her to the main hall of the building. They didn't use the main path, since there was a metal detector there, which would have made them waste precious time.

"A metal detector?" asked Satoshi, a bit surprised by that.

"Yes... It's a legacy of the period when Batcha was the ruler." explained Shion "You know, today Yakuza doesn't carry the respect they showed in the past, and they recruit killers for the most various tasks... At least that was what she usually said. But personally I think that was just another device to inspire dread, to make the others understand that they couldn't joke with her..."

"So nobody can wear a sword, during this council... I see... No, wait. How can you know what your grandmother was used to say? Oryou-san didn't want to see you that often, you have told me once... Am I wrong? Or has Mion-san told you..."

Shion limited herself to smile, and she slid the door. In that moment, their eyes saw a giant room, cold and bare. From the entrance, they could see it was already full. In a corner, the chiefs of the Kimiyoshi family. Next to them, Rika and Hanyuu, as representatives of the Furude family, and then the rest of the club. These people were present as audience, they were behind the others, and they hadn't the right to speak or intervene in a way. Then, sat in front of them, there were Mion, her father, and a limited number of relatives. Opposite them, instead, there was the most of the Sonozaki family, including numerous members coming from Okinomiya. More than forty people in all, including men, women and children. Maybe there wasn't the whole clan in the room, but none of its most influential elements was absent.

While sitting next to her friends, Shion couldn't hear a peep out of any of them. A complete silence reigned inside the hall, everyone looked like owned by a deep state of gathering. They were people who were trying to give the most serious look ever possible, as if they wanted to scare the others. They were used to behave so, finally. No, frankly they neither knew any other way to deal with the others in official occasions. Their glaring face, their motionless eyes. They were all waiting for the beginning of their umpteenth battle, which was about to arrive.

And Mion was doing the same. Exactly like the others, she was attempting to show the cruelest and insensible side of her nature, the one who better suited a council involving the whole family. But had she one? Shion doubted that, and she was wondering why she had been allowed to attend that reunion. Wasn't she the prodigal daughter, the girl repudiated by her own family? Why was she there, then? And why her mother was there, too, the previous heiress who had thrown her title away... And their other friends? She could understand why Rika was there, but what about the others? Shion was worried for her sister, there was something big brewing, that day.

"May I ask who has made the request for a meeting of such an importance?" asked Mion, finally.

"I have."

A cold voice rang out in the air, among the mass of people in front of Mion. The girl turned at the one from whom those words had come out, and she wrinkled her brow in a feeling of slight surprise.

"Oh, Aunt Megumi, I hadn't noticed you were here too. We haven't seen each other for quite a long time. And your visit is so unexpected, I didn't think I would have met you again here, a day."

Megumi Sonozaki nodded, with a serious look. To be honest, rather than her aunt, she was Mion's great-aunt. Namely, she was Oryou's sister. Six years younger than the previous ruler of the family, physically she was quite similar to her, even if she was slightly taller and slimmer. But the effects of aging were starting to appear on her face too, and the furrows beheld above her eyes gave a look of respect and authoritativeness.

Between her and Mion there was not a good relationship, but neither a bad one. Simply, the two women were inclined to ignore each other. When Mion and Shion had come into light, most of the family pretended that Shion had to be suppressed, as if she was a rabid dog. Like someone or something not deserving to exist. Among the few ones who opposed to this idea, there had been Oryou, and Megumi. But, unlike the former's one, the reason who had pushed the latter to take that position were not noble. She was not interested anymore about familiar matters, after what had happened for Akane's marriage.

When Oryou had disinherited her own daughter, after she had decided to marry a man not approved by her mother, Megumi guessed that, as her only sister, she would have been the new heiress of the Sonozaki clan, or at least one of her descendants. She had got unpleasantly surprised, when her sister decided to give that privilege to the first-born son or daughter of the woman she had apparently repudiated. And they had harshly quarreled, because of that choice. _What kind of coherence is this? Do you really think that's a way to punish your daughter? When you die she will take control over Hinamizawa, thanks to her influence on her sons, anyways! She will be the ruler of the village, despite your roaring curses against her! This is how the Sonozakis handle this kind of things, then? Saving your apparency, and letting everything else be as it already is? You're going to hear the other Great Families, and the other people inside the village, they are going to charge you of being a mindless ruler. They won't show respect at the Sonozaki family anymore, because of your guilt!..._

Those were the tones of that long and furious diatribe, between the two most influent members of the family. But Oryou, who was still the leader, didn't surrender to her sister's heat. Maybe because she still loved her daughter, maybe because she wanted her own descendants to go on being the ruler, the point was that she didn't change her mind. The habit of mind given to her by her bloodline suggested her that this was the right choice, and, in her usual authoritarian tone, she had clearly made the others understand she wouldn't accepted any further remark about the matter.

Therefore, Megumi started not to show interest in the family anymore. When she was asked her point of view about the "Shion" affair, she had answered tiredly _Let her live, she won't harm us more than what Oryou-sama did, and after all you shouldn't care about them, the family had already been driven to its ruin months ago... _She was conscious her word had no value, she had got the prove of it in the past. And in fact she had transferred from Hinamizawa to Okinomiya, getting married again (her first husband had died during the World War II, when he was only thirty and they had already a son) and not seeing any other member of the family anymore, until that day. Far from the world she once lived in, and far also from the money Oryou availed of, in the form of loans, to keep control of the other relatives.

Therefore, she had kept on staying inside her ivory tower, during all those years, ignoring what happened to Hinamizawa, and to her past family. Oryou too didn't want to know what her sister was doing, her pride was too strong to succumb to regrets. They had neither met the man she had married with her second wedding. They didn't know what was his name, unusual thing for the Sonozaki family, used to be aware of everything inside their zone of influence. Oryou didn't want to know, and Mion had decided to respect her grandmother's will. And finally she didn't like her. Megumi hadn't wished for Shion's death, in the past, but she had always behaved coldly, towards both of the twins. With the passing of the time, some of the other relatives, regretting to have aimed for her death right after her birth, had started to be a bit more friendly with Shion, of course when they were far from the matriarch. That woman, instead, looked like the ones who still considered Shion as junk. No greeting cards, no signs of affection... She didn't care about her, as about anything about the family, and this peeved a lot Mion, for whom family matters were fundamental, instead. That was why the pony-tailed girl neither considered her as a relative. But since nobody had banished her until that moment, she was allowed to come and join the council exactly like all the others.

But why was she there? That cold day, when Mion had asked for the one who had requested that council, she had been the one who answered, making the girl's curiosity increase greatly. The old woman would have satisfied soon that wish of her. She slided slightly forward, keeping herself sat on her legs, and finally she spoke:

"Sonozaki Mion-sama, I'm here to ask you politely to resign, and leave the headship of our family to someone else."

Nobody dared to answer. That was something never seen, in all the history of the Sonozaki family. A young leader, man or woman, who willingly renounces to his role... it hadn't ever been happened. In order to be the ruler, there was a specific rite to follow, and even Mion had accomplished it. A boring and tiresome ceremony, but which gave to the person who fulfilled it the right to be the chief of the clan during all his life. And the only cases where someone had effectively given his powers to his descendants involved old people who had realized not to be anymore able to hold that role, like Oryou, for example. But it had never happened that a young woman, at the height of her power, resigned from such an assignment.

Mion preferred not to answer, so Akane took the floor: "I'm aware that you look at Mion-sama like at a usurper, and that you have never loved her, but might you explain the reasons which are pushing you to such a request?"

Megumi didn't look at the woman, there was still a feeling of resentment, between them. So, she kept on observing the young girl in front of her, and she answered, with words sharp and cold like knives of ice:

"You don't have it in you to hold the reins of the family. I have seen it during last December, when we have faced Nabiha and his horrible plan. We have been forced to recur to an external help to get through the matter, and even today we don't know the name of who really has tried to ruin us. Only some month has been passed since your settlement, but you have already demonstrated your full inability."

"Ruin _us,_ you're saying? I had never thought you were still consider yourself a member of our family." Mion tried to react. She raised her eyes towards her, and she scanned her angrily. But she was visibly influenced by what had occurred in the previous period. Megumi grinned, likely pleased to see her in that condition, and she made a beckoned sign to the man sat next to her, who immediately stood up, and walked towards Mion and Akane.

"I've never seen him in this Manor." commented the latter. "Could you do us the favor to tell us who he is?"

"Well... we could define him as my servant. Have you never met him?"

"I didn't know you had one. You are not that wealthy, I don't think you can afford more than two or three subordinates."

"Hmph, Once I have the necessary money, there's nothing bad in it. Or were you rather pretending to be the only ones who can have some of them, thanks to some notorious divine right?" Akane scanned the man approaching them. Around her same age, quite short but strong and muscular. He was wearing a black outfit, black like his short hair, formal as if he was attending a funeral. As a matter of fact, there was no joy onto his serious and severe face.

The man stopped when he was half a meter far from Mion. Then he knelt slowly. Very slowly.

And, suddenly, he moved.

Before anyone could even hint at a reaction, a short knife of obsidian had appeared from under his sleeve, and with a swift and precise movement he had split the back of Mion's kimono into two equal parts. Without a single tear of blood, the pieces of cloth fell from her body, and her friends got terrified, together with the other ones present behind her, when they saw what there was under them.

On Mion's back, they could see the tattoo she was carrying.

The pony-tailed girl immediately realized the aim of that man's gesture, and she tried to sustain what remained of her kimono with her hands, in an useless attempt to hide that drawing. Unfortunately, it wasn't enough to cover it up.

Only after some endless seconds Kasai arrived, and he covered her with his own coat. But it was too late. They had seen that white spectral face, those bloodthirsty eyes, those hideous horns, surrounded by those dry and thorny brambles... They had seen all of that, they had seen how they want her true nature to look like.

A warm tear fell from Mion's eye, while Megumi grinned satisfied. Now it was clear why so many people had been invited. She wanted her humiliation to be seen by as many individuals as possible. So, the old woman exclaimed: "You have understood what I mean, now. The Sonozaki family has always founded its power on the fear and the respect their leader was able to induce, together with many other things. And so a strong leader is necessary, or better he is vital for our survival. You can't ensure this, Mion-san, then step aside and don't cause further damages to all of us."

"And maybe you'd like to take her place, wouldn't you?" Keiichi shouted.

"You are not supposed to speak here. Know your place, and don't disturb us." Megumi briefly answered.

"Even if I disobey, the shame on me won't be as huge as the one on you! Have you realized what you have done?"

"These disrespectful boys. However, I will show more dignity than you, and I will answer to your question, even if it has been put in such a impolite way. I don't want that role. I have refused it a lot of years ago, and I wouldn't have more right to get it than what the others have. On the other hand, because of this, I think that every member who is here must think about this possibility. If he thinks to have the capacity to be the new chief, he's allowed to propose his own candidacy."

"You're talking as if Mion has already resigned! Don't think it will be so easy!"

"You would like to draw me to a long verbal fight, like the one at the Prefecture? I have been informed about the details... And personally I prefer deeds rather than words. Now that everyone has seen her, how can you even imagine she can become still a good leader?"

"She has a lot of friends who care about her, exactly like what happens for every leader. A person completely alone, without good counselors, _can't _be a good ruler, because he can't be as good as what he would be if he had some of them."

Megumi had always lived alone, far from the family, and she wasn't pleased with that comment, as the look on her face clearly showed. Unwillingly, Keiichi's one was a cheap shot. But it didn't matter, after all. Keiichi was determined not to surrender, and the others would have helped him. But before doing that, there was something else he had to take care of. After saying that last phrase, Keiichi waved to Shion, who quickly caught what he meant. She went to Hanyuu and she asked her to bring Mion out of the hall. She wasn't fit to sustain that discussion, at the moment.

…

Thirty minutes later, Mion was still into her bedroom, sat on the chair next to her desk, with Hanyuu trying to relieve her, without success. The green-haired girl had pulled off her ripped kimono, and she was wearing her usual winter clothes. But she hadn't said a word since she had reached the room. The purple-haired girl was worried, the words directed to her friend didn't receive any answer, as if she was speaking with an inanimate object, and not to a person in the flesh.

Hanyuu was disoriented. Trying to feel useful, she leaned a glass full of water on the desk, to invite Mion to drink it, and then, once she realized her friend didn't react to her invitation, staying still on the chair, she started to look at her, dejected. _They have asked me to go with her because I can't deal with a serious discussion... But I can't help her. I can't find the way to give her a hand, all I can do is calling for her, uselessly... I would like people's mind to be like open books for me, I would like it so much. If only psychology had been invented in the past I would have study it, to help people around me... Now, instead... What can I do? Convince her she's not a Demon? She already knows it, I think. At least I hope so... But what if I am wrong? Feeling like different from the rest of the community, because of the marks on your body... I can understand these feelings, I have experienced them too in the past. When I had to ask Ouka to kill me, I did so because the inhabitants hated Demons, and my horns made of me their symbol... Poor Ouka, what made you change so dramatically? What made you desire to destroy the village you loved so much? _

In that moment she heard the door of the room sliding. A known figure appeared, and it entered, after closing the door back.

"Gi-chan" exclaimed Hanyuu "Why are you here? Is the meeting over?"

"No, it isn't. At all. They are shouting as lunatics, maybe you should be able to hear them even from this distance. Wait a second." He opened the door again, and a background noise filled the room. Hanyuu kept her ears skinned, and after a while she smiled. She couldn't decipher the exact words pronounced, but the voices she could hear sounded like Keiichi's and Shion's ones.

"They don't seem to be tired at all." she exclaimed, while Giancarlo closed the sliding door.

"You're right... they could have crashed my poor eardrums, if I had stayed there."

"Indeed... but why are you here, then?"

"I'm not a good speaker, and I really can't shout, I have never been able to. There are already quarrelers enough, down there. The situation is quite stirred up, with people accusing each others, idealists and opportunists around... I guessed they have neither noticed me while I was exiting the hall." He sighed, then he observed the other girl in the room. "Rather, how is she, now?"

Hanyuu shook her head: "She doesn't react... She looks like a chalk statue, I fear."

Giancarlo approached her, and he asked, softly: "Mii-chan, it's me, Giancarlo... How are you?"

No answer.

"I wanted... to apologize, somehow. I should have understood what they were planning to do, but... I have never had good reflexes, and my instinct never works properly. I always need some time, to understand what is happening around me." he smiled, bitterly "Like in all nearly all the games we've played... I have lost every first match, waiting for the second one to find a countermeasure... Fortunately we usually play a game several times in each session, so I have time to make up for the initial losses, and to overtake Kei-chan..." He tried to laugh, but the result sounded extremely constrained "And like the day when we play billiards, do you remember? I had to look at Kei-chan and you for an hour, before finding out how the game really worked. If I had been the first one playing... I would have been a disaster. Yes, it's my fault too, if only I had been more acute, downstairs..."

No answer, again.

"Have you seen her?" commented Hanyuu "Hauu, I don't know what to do..."

Giving way to a few despondency, the Italian boy looked for another chair, but there was only one in the room, the one Mion was sat on. So, his only choice was to kneel to the floor, like what he had done on the lower floor. Since he was taller than her when both of them were standing, with that posture Mion's head was higher than his, but the difference of height between the two of them was acceptable, being sufficiently small and suitable for a potential dialogue between the two of them. Once sat down in that way, in fact, he tried to call her two or three times, without success. Therefore, he stopped, and he observed her for a while, still sat on the floor by her. Motionless, he started to think about a different strategy.

He remained so for some minute. But then, he slowly raised his arm, and after delicately pushing away one of Mion's hands he began to touch her right leg with a finger, moving it up and down, as if he was following the line of one of her veins. Of course, he couldn't see any of it under her blue-jeans, but that had no importance, it was a way to tease her, softly. In fact, while doing it, he said: "You don't look wishing to answer, so if you don't have any will you don't mind if I continue, do you?"

He kept on doing so for four or five minutes, at the same time placidly and stubbornly, until Mion finally whispered: "Please stop, it's annoying."

"So you still belong to this world. Good news." he replied. Then he stood up, and while leaning against the wall he added only "I am here. If you want, blow off the steam on me. I will wait for you patiently, don't worry if nobody breathes a word for a while."

He did what he had announced, and he stopped speaking. Now the three of them were silent and still in that little room, creating an unreal atmosphere only broken from time to time by some shout higher than normal, coming from the main hall of the Manor. Hanyuu didn't dare moving a muscle of her body, fearing that breaking that silence from the inside was something comparable to a terrible sin. She struggled being immobile, waiting for the expected unfolding of events to take place.

In fact, some minute later, they were still there. Mion was sat on her chair, while Giancarlo and Hanyuu were by her. They were waiting, wordless. She would have spoken, in the end. All they had to do was waiting, as guardian angels who were guarding her with infinite patience.

And, in fact, in the end she gave up. Slowly, she turned at them, asking "Are you still there?"

Hanyuu nodded: "Hauu, we had told you we wouldn't have hustled you."

"Yes... you're right..." Mion moved their legs in order to sit more comfortably, and to be able to look them in the face without twisting her back. She swallowed, and then she begun to speak.

"Hanyuu-chan, Gi-chan... do you think that Megumi-san is right?"

"NO! SHE I-" Hanyuu tried to shout, but Giancarlo blocked her. Then the boy asked her: "Why are you thinking so?"

It took more than twenty seconds for her to answer: "Well... you have seen it. My tattoo..."

She swallowed another time, before going on.

"That tattoo should be the symbol which shows my belongings to the Demonic bloodline which has ruled over Hinamizawa during all the centuries. It should be a sign of my strength, and instead... "

_Instead..._ She started to cry, and Hanyuu approached her, trying to hug her sad friend, as much as her short arms allowed her to do.

"I don't want this tattoo!" Mion shouted, fallen prey to a deep droop "I don't want this tattoo! It describes me in a wrong way. It says that I am a strong woman, a woman who fears nothing, a woman who is able to defeat enemies and obstacles 100 times bigger than her. Look at me, instead! I can do nothing but crying, and complaining like a little baby. I wouldn't fear to get an extraordinary force, somehow! I would like to be strong like a Demon, I would like to be like a Demon itself! I'd better be so! But I can't... I am not worth a hundredth of what Batcha was..."

Despite she was nearly screaming now, nobody outside the room heard her outpouring, they all were still in the hall, concerned about different matters. Inside it, instead, Mion had burst into tears, still embraced by Hanyuu, while Giancarlo was still looking at the scene. Until he said:

"Mii-chan, won't you be offended if I tell you something?"

"What... what is it?"

"Mii-chan, what you have just said shows that you're too influenced by your tattoo. Of course, you can't remove it from your back, but you can't let it cause you so many fears."

Mion instinctively pushed Hanyuu away from her, and she approached the boy who dared giving that suggestion.

"Did you really feel the need to say it?" she asked, angry "Do you know what living with that means? Everybody points at you like the incoming ruler, the future _Demon_. Everybody expects marvelous things from you, and this responsibility can make your life a real Hell... I have been pushed by this feeling, it has caused me a myriad of sleepless nights... This tattoo is the emblem of what a Sonozaki leader aims to be... and _you _pretend that I should forget it? As if on my back there were only a few pimples?"

"Hmph, yours is only a watercolor, in the end." he answered roughly.

"WHAT?" Mion violently hit her desk with an abrupt movement of her fist, and then she shouted wrathful: "This thing has changed my whole life and you dare calling it a watercolor? You don't know how you feel alike with this on your back! You couldn't understand even if I explained it to you for the next hundred years! But... but..." she started to drop some tear again, too exhausted even to continue being furious.

"I am glad to see you have reacted to your state of hollow, finally." the boy commented.

"Glad? Even if it means obliging the others to hate you, because of your behavior?" she answered, in a state hung between anger, desperation and confusion. "I... I know you have said that only to force me to bare my teeth."

"Or your claws, since we're talking about Demons." he interrupted her ironically.

"Yes... whatever." she replied, annoyed. She had recovered a few verve, but now she was lowering again her glance. She wanted to make sure of something: "However, you didn't talk seriously when you had defined it _only a watercolor_, am I right?"

He was about to answer, but a voice forewent him: "Hauuu, yes, there was something I wanted to ask you about it, too, Gi-chan."

The others turned at Hanyuu.

"What do you mean?"

"Well... Rika had taught me about the way you weigh your words... _Yours is only a watercolor_... _Yours_ is only a watercolor..."

Mion opened her eyes wide, looking at him. "_Yours?_"

Giancarlo sighed, as to gather some courage, and he started to unbutton his shirt.

"Yes, I wanted you to see a thing, in the end, after what has happened downstairs. I would have used other words, otherwise." He sighed again, nervous and uneasy, but he was resolute to go on. "Mion, I didn't mean to be disrespectful to the sorrow you had to undergo in the past, and even now. Even because I know what having your body marked means, I'd... I'd really like you to know that. But when I said that phrase, I wanted to say that, during all these years, probably your tattoo hasn't influenced your life like _this_ has done with me."

He took off the right sleeve of his shirt, and for a moment Mion felt like vomiting at that sight.


	36. Locked boy

**36 – Locked boy ~ The secret soul**

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**NOTE: Inside this chapter there are references to Giancarlo and Alice's birth (second part of Ch. 13) and to Alice's story (Ch. 23). If there's something you don't understand, go back to those chapters.  
**

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_Hinamizawa, 5th February 1984_

The show Mion was forced to admire despite herself was spine chilling. In front of her, there was an arm scarred by two long lines. Two interminable cicatrices which, starting from the shoulder and arriving next to the wrist, disfigured his skin, which in turn was mottled, covered by an infinity of bruises and other spots which assumed a violaceous color, and which were placed mostly in proximity of the scars and of the zones they had been sutured. It was so likely because of some rash due to the state of the limb, and Mion guessed that the arm needed some periodic check up, in order keep his conditions under control. No wonder he preferred to hide it, the skin itself was visibly rough and wrinkled there, unpleasant to the sight, and probably to the touch too. But the most unusual detail was that those scars looked like following a straight line, through his whole tortured arm. Their shape was not irregular, like in case of a fortuitous incident, and they were by far too long... They had been made on purpose, by someone.

Mion stared at them, and she asked, stunned: "Those... those two scars..."

"There is a third one, on the back of my arm, you can't see it from there." He twisted his shoulder slightly, and another sinister line appeared. Then, Hanyuu handed him his shirt, to invite him to wear it again, and so he thanked her for her gesture. It was uselessly painful, for him, to go on showing those horrible marks.

"I... I didn't..." Mion babbled "I... didn't know that you... I..."

"To be honest, instead, I was suspecting something."

Rika was there now, too. After all, the council down there sounded not to ever end. So, she had joined them, guessing that something important was taking place there, and adding: "These explains a lot of things... The long sleeves during summer days... Your reaction when Keiichi feigned to cut your arm... So I wasn't that wrong, that time, you did are hiding something."

Giancarlo preferred not to turn his eyes at her: "You're right. Now you know why I was saying these have influenced my life so much. Nee-chan likes to tease me sometimes, claiming I am a bookworm... But in the end I've become so because I couldn't be anyone else. These wounds are extremely crippling, and I can't do any hard physical activity. The pain wouldn't be bearable, and they might begin to bleed again, if I exceed. So, since I had always had to spend a lot of time at home... there was not much else I could choose between. Do you know? When Alice started practicing fencing, I would have liked imitating her, as every rivalry between brother and sister would pretend. But I couldn't. A thrust in the wrong place would have been enough to cause a chaos inside the armory. That's why I had to stand aside, and just watch her performances. And I fear this has been a real pity... even for Alice. If I could have challenged her, she would have trained harder, incited by that stimulus, and she would have been a much more skilled swordswoman, I guess. Seeing me there on the fence, instead, as if I was isolated from her, must have vexed her a lot."

"But so... Hauuu... Did anybody know about this... Besides Ali-chan and Flavia-san, of course?"

"Yes, they weren't the only ones. To be honest even Irie-sensei was aware of it. Of course, since he's our doctor here we couldn't hide it to him, the first medical check up would have revealed them to him. We have just asked him not to tell about them to anybody else, and he had accepted, he had been very comprehensive luckily. On the other hand, I would have had to inform Chie-sensei too, if I had been a normal student of your school, but since we attend it only to improve our Japanese we haven't to do any particular physical activity, and then she knows nothing about this, exactly like you, until now."

"I... I see..."

Giancarlo smiled sadly at the other girls: "But now I am sure there is an exact question you are wondering about, in your heads..."

"Indeed" Rika nodded "_Where they come from__."_

"Yes..." repeated Mion "What has happened to you, to harm you to such a point?"

The boy closed his eyes, as to forcedly bring to his mind a memory his soul didn't want to evoke. While keeping them locked, he started to recount: "You already know about my birth, and about our great-grandfather, Alice had told you, hadn't she?"

"Yes. The difficulties Ali-chan had met to awake... and the fact that that man was not a heart of gold."

"In fact... Nee-chan should have told you that great-grandpa had begun to study esotericism, in the last years of his life. Probably he feared to die soon, and he had started to study about the magics our ancestors were said to avail of. You know, Serco's old village had been built in the 13th century, all around a hill. Local historians explain that it had been placed there because defensively it was a zone with a certain strategic importance, but because of it, the old layout of the village itself reminded a circular shape, seen from above. After all, the name _Serco_ itself comes from a dialectal word which means _circle_. Circular shape, then circles, then circuits. Magical circuits. Since circles were the symbols of magic and alchemy, in the past, legends and alternative theories about that shape quickly arose, and a lot of people believe to them. Including great-grandpa. He was particularly interested in the development of his magical circuit, his... _Sympathiae Sanguis_, or whatsoever was its supposed name. You see, after he had died his books were still there, and I had taken a glance at them, before burning them. He was a maniac of that genre of texts, and he wanted to learn every single notion contained inside them. His aim was to build up his own powers, to become a sort of magician, likely in order to live for a longer period, maybe like all those characters inside the Old Testament, which usually died when they where 800, or 900 years old..."

"That's a real advanced age."

"Yes, but I didn't make that example randomly. He was a very religious man, he had always attended his daily Mass. Of course, that was an hypocritical behavior, typical of a sanctimonious person rather than of a pious one. You can't go inside a Church, claiming to confess your sins, acting like a pure man and singing that God is Love, and then come back to home and torment your own family as if nothing has happened. What's the sense of it?" While pronouncing those last words, he had pitched his voice slightly higher, not being able to hold completely back his frustration. Anyways, he deeply breathed, to recover his self-control, and he went on.

"I wanted to say, he was looking for a sort of prodigy which could provide him a longer life, probably brought from some angel sent by God Himself. He had been subjugated by all those books, they were full of references to the Bible, to the Holy Mysteries, and to all sorts of Angels, Saints and other creatures. That was the way to write about "Science", in the period they had been written, explaining the most complicated things in the most complicated Latin. Then, that _Sympathiae Sanguis _was seen like a gift, given to some human after some incredible exploits, and usually used in the past by exorcists to fight Evil, to kill Demons with complex rites and ceremonies. Kill Demons, that's really funny..." He grinned bitterly "_If it was effectively true, I'd be here to kill all of you_..."

He shook his head, and then he raised his eyes to Rika: "People who pretend to be a God, or sent by God, are the ones who scare me more, Rika-chan. There is no single chance to convince them they are wrong, if you don't fully agree with them they immediately accuse you to be sent by Evil, and they don't listen to you anymore. They only give heed to their mind, which slowly becomes like a holy messenger, or even like God Himself for them, and so they are trapped in a vicious cycle, which can be nothing but harmful for them and the ones around them. They claim not to obey to anyone, because they claim to be accountable only to God, or another entity not well defined, which is a way not to be accountable to anyone. Using God's name in this way is very convenient, don't you agree? And so our great-grandfather imagined to conduct his research for a noble purpose, as if an Angel had ordered him to live forever, and to go on being an imaginary ambassador of God. And I don't exclude he was really persuaded of this, in spite of what he had done to his family in the previous years; his brain had begun not to work properly, as far as I have been told. Yes, he was studying those books claiming to obey to a divine will... He was looking for something arranged by God, something which could help him to get what he was looking for. Namely, he was searching for a miracle."

"A miracle?" asked Hanyuu. It was the first time she heard that word in a so negative connotation. Her friends and she were looking for it, they were desiring it, when they were fighting Takano, because it was the only way to defeat her. An instrument whose purpose was noble, something which would have led them to happiness. That case, instead, was completely different. Neither Ouka had talked about the Miracles that scornfully, when she had appeared in front of her inside the Saiguden.

The purple-haired girl went back to look at Giancarlo. The boy was trying to swallow, but his throat looked alike blocked by an invisible obstacle which obstructed it. "Yes, he was searching for a miracle. And our birth_ really looked like _a miracle."

He turned his glance to the floor, now. "The way Alice was able to survive had seemed incredible to the others, and there was not any real scientific explanation for it. Along the corridors of that clinic they had formulated plausible theories, of course, the most probable one was a commencement of frostbite which had involved her, but there was no certainty, and it was impossible to verify the various hypotheses, they had found that Nee-chan was a little healthy baby, after the analysis they had made out of prevention. However, even if there had been a real enlightenment for it, our great-grandfather wouldn't have accepted it. For him, it was a prodigy, wished by Someone in the sky to show him the right way for his research, and whoever disagreed with him was a stupid moron who didn't understand anything about secrets of life, no matter whether he was a peasant or the top clinician of the hospital. That was the miracle he was waiting for, his deranged mind didn't need to know nothing else. For him, it was me who had saved my sister's life."

"Immediately after our birth, he flung himself to his study, and he did nothing but reading and consulting his sooty texts for the following three years, looking for a "reasonable" explanation. From his point of view, it was clear that I had activated my _Sympathiae Sanguis _unwillingly, to rescue her from death. But that was strange even for him, there was something not working in that ism. In his opinion, I was too little, a baby couldn't make use of that complicated sort of magic, according to his sacred books. Only the eldest men could, only an old person could avail of it, as if it was a replacement for the physical strength they had progressively lost: the fibers made of magical power which, as time goes by, take the place of the fibers of muscles..."

"That research lasted some year, with no worthy results, as far as I know. That fruitlessness had made him more and more nervous, and the rest of the family usually paid for it. My very first memory is me next to Mom while she was crying, in her bedroom..." His closed fist was leaned on the desk, and Rika could see it trembling "That man couldn't make out not to be able to find the truth. Those books were the emissaries of the divine wisdom, and the fact they didn't explain what had happened was incredibly enervating, for him. He started to wonder who I was, then... It couldn't be the fault of those books, so it had to be mine. If my nature wasn't described in those texts inspired by God, I was something God hadn't considered, somebody who God hadn't created. And if I was something extraneous to God, I had to be a Devil, a malign creature."

"Can I interrupt you a moment?" asked Hanyuu "How can you know all these things about your great-grandpa's point of view? Had you found a diary, maybe?"

"He had one, indeed, but I got rid of them without either opening it, it was full of loathings, for sure. I... I know them because he told them to me a day, when I was four, as if they were a sort of lesson, and he was the teacher scorning the pupil in front of him. I will never forget those words... I will never forget that day."

He let out a soft indistinct noise, coming from his dejection.

"That day, he brought me to his study, and he locked the door. I was too young to oppose him, to even understand what he was planning to do. I couldn't stand the smoke filling the air inside the room, so I wasn't happy to stay there, but there was nothing I could do, at that time I was already aware of what it might happen to me if I had defied him and made him angry, I was scared by him. I still remember that moment, he was next to me, while he has making me sat on the armchair... He was euphoric, he was claiming that he would have continued what venerable people in the past had started, that he would have added new pages to those old books. He would have described what was not present on them, for the sake of Science. And in order to do so, he had told me while putting a handkerchief on my nose, there definitely was only a way. _He would have seen the circuit inside my body with his own eyes..._"

Giancarlo made a pause, the memory was getting more and more sorrowful. Hanyuu suggested him to stop the tale, but he answered he was fine, while holding the right arm with the left one and silently sobbing.

"I woke up a couple of minutes later, I couldn't look at the time on the clock at that age, but the position of its hands suggested me that just a very few time had passed. The deafening noise around me had awakened me, despite the chloroform I had probably inhaled. I've never discovered who gave the alarm, Alice would have told me if it had been her. But I remember the door worn out, I remember all those people running towards me, or away from me, I remember all those screams, those signs of anger and shock... But before they could lean a hand on my eyes not to let me see it, I gave a look at my arm, which was aching. And it was the worst thing I had ever seen."

He violently closed his eyes, as if that far show was still in front of him, and he didn't want to watch his own past. "There was those deep cuts, on my arm... All that blood flowing out of it... Those incisions were so deep that I could see even some white spot on my arm, I could see my own bones!" He had started to shout "My own flesh had been like dismembered, like a mere piece of meat, I couldn't move my hand, no, I was terrified to move it! I feared that if I moved it the pain would have increased, I couldn't stand at it! I cried, I cried as never before, as a kid deprived of his same soul!"

He had started to cry even in front of the other girls now, but he quickly stopped, even before than someone could try to relieve him. That sad story hadn't finished yet, he had to continue.

"They immediately brought me to the hospital, to undergo emergency surgery. I have been lucky, they were afraid of worse consequences, I could have lost the usage of the whole limb... However, since that day my arm is like the one you have just seen."

Another pause.

"You know, I wasn't a lefty, when I was born. I was used to draw with the right hand. But since that day I had to begin to use the left hand to write, and to do any other thing, even if it wasn't natural at all, for me. I had to make the other arm rest as much as possible, especially in the very following months to that... that event."

"But... what happened to your great-grandfather? Had your family... flown over even such a horrid crime, because he was the chief?"

He raised his head, assuming suddenly a serious pose: "No, they didn't. It was the straw that broke the camel's back. They looked for him, resolute not to let him get away with it, but he had run away. They searched for him for many days, in the surrounding woods and villages, until they found him. He had somehow been able to reach his study again, and there he had dead."

"Had been... killed by anyone? Someone who wanted to take revenge without being seen?"

"I wasn't told so. The official version reported that the cause of his decease had been heart failure. He was very old, so it was possible, but of course, this is just what I know about it, I have never read the dossier about the case... Frankly I can't exclude that things have gone differently... Maybe someone did have killed him, and he hid the truth. Nobody wanted to make sure of it, honestly, the anger and the sorrow were too high, in that moment."

"I remember the period I was into the hospital... Alice had gone and seen me, once. She didn't stop crying, disturbing the other patients... One of them even ordered her to stop, shouting impolitely. Insensible man. However, I had asked her not to cry anymore, too. She was so sad... I didn't want her to be so. But she answered that she couldn't stop, because she remembered that I had cried in turn so desperately, when I had been found in his study. I had cried, so she was crying. She was sad because I hadn't been able to choke back my tears." He wasn't talking to the girls, now. It was a monologue with his soul, as if nobody was around him "It wasn't... It wasn't fair. Why had I to make her suffer so much? It wouldn't have made my pain lighter. I had... I had to hide my pain, my sorrow. I had promised myself not to show my feelings to the outside, from that day. My life had already been ruined... But I could still avoid that the others' ones ran into that same destiny."

"And you became a bookworm, then." Rika interrupted him, waking him up from that distressing state of unconsciousness. "But don't you think it's... ironical? All of you hated him, and in spite of this you studied and read books exactly like him."

He looked at her, surprised and with a grain of confusion in his eyes: "I... I haven't ever seen it in this way, I suppose you have got a point. But, as I have said before, it wasn't like I had more choices... Once my body is out of order, my mind is what I have been left, so I had to learn to use it in the best way possible."

"Another thing. Earlier, when you said you had decided to hide your nature, you were talking as if you had become a very introvert boy, but after all I have seen shier people than you, in my life..." Rika seemed deeply interested in him. Some time before she had promised she wouldn't have tried to know anything about his past, but since he had willingly renounced to that right, she wanted to take advantage of it as much as possible.

"Because people are influenced by what occurs around them, as I've said. These... scars have upset my life, but after that day other ones have arrived, with their facts and situations. And the experience they make you acquire makes you change again. I was a shy boy, when I was young, but one day arrived when I had to muster up the poor courage inside my body."

"The day you had announced you would have been the ruler of your family, I suppose."

He nodded: "You're right, Rika-chan. I thought that my life had already been wasted, but it was not necessary to drive my father to my same end, don't you agree? I knew that it was a dramatically hard job, that it wasn't a game at all, but in the end I never would have been happy like the other kids, and even if I failed, my life wouldn't have got worse, it was already a disaster... This was what I thought. I was a very gloomy boy, in that period."

"You haven't changed that much since then, honestly..."

Giancarlo endeavored a smile, as reaction to Rika's barb: "Yes, maybe you're right. But when I was so young I was even worse than this. In the end taking that role means becoming more extrovert, talking more... It was something against my real nature, but I had promised to do it, so I had to do it. And finally... if the one more marked by the past shows not to surrender, even the others inside the family will react, don't you think so? It was... the only possible solution to dissolve that fear still stirring over the souls of all of us."

"Then you're saying it was a kind of sacrifice." commented Hanyuu. That disenchanted speech had reminded her Ouka's one.

"A sacrifice? No, I don't think so. In order to be so, my life had to be very worthy... But it wasn't so. I didn't think it was so. From my point of view, I was using something which would have been useless, otherwise. It was like... like using a trunk of a tree you have already cut down. Keeping it in one piece and placing on a vertical position again won't allow the tree to come back to life, it's already dead. But it can be used to light a wood fire, to allow the others to survive from coldness, and to grant them a more comfortable night. You destroy what is left of it, but you do it for a legitimate cause, and nobody will complain for it, after all there was nothing you could do for the original tree."

"You are talking about your choice as if it had been a path of suffering." exclaimed Mion, speaking for the first time after a while.

"You're right, but in fact it was so, especially in the beginning. When I had to travel abroad to talk with the relatives emigrated all over Europe, but also at home... Can you imagine how many times they have taunted me what great-grandpa had done? They had accused me to want to do the same. They were scared, now I know that... and they had unbosomed that distressing feeling against me. Hearing all those slanders about me, and not being able to answer... I would have gone mad, without my relatives' support. It had been so hard, it took so much time to bring the situation back to normality..."

"But you were able to make it." replied Hanyuu, smiling "It's a very remarkable result."

"Because we all wanted so. If I was alone, I couldn't have changed that destiny. But finally they were only angry against him, not against me, I wasn't seen as an enemy. They were afraid that the past was about to come back again, that was why they were so aggressive. Once they had understood the truth, after a while, it became much easier. But... How many terrible days I had to undergo..." He violently drew in with his nose, likely to hold back further tears.

"I still don't understand why your family has let you do such a painful thing. Don't they have a conscience?"

"I had insisted, listening to no reason. They had to surrender, in the end."

"It doesn't make any difference. Kids get so often stubborn, in a lot of circumstances, and it's every adult's duty to..."

"But I insisted, I insisted, I insisted..."

"I've said it's not the point..."

"But I insisted..."

_Why is he repeating that? _Suddenly a brainstorm appeared in Rika's mind, disclosing to her the truth.

"Gi-chan... Aren't you sure that... Nothing else had happened, in those days?"

Giancarlo didn't dare looking at her. He didn't answer for a while, absent-minded and immobile. His soul really seemed elsewhere, incredibly far from his body. But finally he whispered: "It's... It's even more absurd than what I've told you until now."

"I'm used to such stories. Don't worry about it."

Sadness and sorrow were painted on Giancarlo's eyes, but he decided to content her. He opened his mouth, and slowly he answered: "_I had made a dream..."_

Rika ground her teeth, at the same time satisfied and frustrated by that answer. _I knew that..._ She quickly took back her control, and she listened to the boy's last part of story.

"During the previous nights, I was going on dreaming about the death of all my family. Alice suddenly became violent, for a reason I didn't understand, and despite the others' effort she got out of control, until she killed Mom by mistake with a heavy stick. Then Dad strangled her due to an uncontrollable anger, before committing suicide once having realized what he had done. And so on... my Uncles, my Grandparents... all dead... all murdered, in front of my eyes. And in the end I was alone, deprived of my family, despised by the others who hadn't forgotten about my great-grandfather, and destined to a miserable life, a hopeless existence inside a grey orphanage..." His breath had got extremely wheezy, and he had sat on the floor, like a man whose strength failed him. That memory was still vivid in his mind, and even if it was only a nightmare for him, it was as painful as a real misfortune.

"It's all OK." said Hanyuu, taking him by the hand "It has _never _happened in this world, you are aware of it, aren't you?"

"Yes, I am... But it was so realistic... And that sound in the end of it was tormenting me, it was making my life Hell."

"Which sound?"

He raised his look again, realizing that they couldn't know anything about it: "Yes... That one. I meant the sound of a carillon."

"Why a carillon?"

"It wasn't the sound of an ordinary carillon. I could recognize it. It was the one my great-grandfather used to have in his study. You know, _that day..._ He had set it in motion. I don't know why... Maybe it was a way to make me calm, before committing that... that thing. I could still hear it, while they were bringing me to the hospital. And even after. Even after, for a long, long while."

He went to Mion's desk, and he touched it with a finger: "Days, weeks, months later... that melody was still there, jangling in my mind. I couldn't remove it, it didn't leave me in peace. It was... It was the symbol of what had happened to my arm, it was becoming a persecution." Now he was smiling, strangely "You know, that carillon doesn't exist anymore, now. Some month after his death, by random, someone activated it again, and immediately I ran away, terrified by that sound, screaming like owned by a devil. They had to chase after me until the Old Tower... Oh, sure, you don't know about it. Well, it's a place not that near to home, I had run for quite a long time."

"The day after the carillon had vanished, and someone noticed it. After a quick inquiry they heard that Alice had smashed it into pieces, throwing it from a deep scarp not far from home. She had confessed it, showing to be proud of that action, and she was punished, even if quite lightly. She only hadn't her dessert after lunch. They couldn't blame her seriously, after what had happened the day before. Moreover, she didn't look to mind about that punishment, she likely thought not to have made anything bad. So I went to her, and I asked her why had she done it. As answer, she limited herself to smile and hug me, and then she proposed me to play Hide and Seek with her. Yes, I knew that... she had done that to protect me. That object was driving me crazy, through its sound it was like a Bogeyman who was looking for me... And she had got rid of it, definitely: maybe my relatives would have just hidden it somewhere, but her decision was more drastic. And she made the right choice, I'd say... Knowing that she taking care of me was so relieving, and so that disturbing song disappeared from my nights. I suppose that Alice and I have a good relationship because of what happened in that period: we hardly ever quarrel, generally. I could never do that... She's my Guardian Angel."

"And so you had forgotten it... until you began having those nightmares?"

"Y-Yes... It's true. But honestly I didn't think it was out of place, on the contrary... That melody had accompanied me during my saddest periods, during all the worst days of my life... It _had _to ring out, in that scenario. It was there because I desired it, I realized. It was necessary, among all those tragedies and deaths, his absence would have been unnatural. Those notes had been the beginning of my incubus... they would have been also the end of it, and everything would have made a sense, in one way or the other. While shipwrecking inside that ocean of Madness, that melody was making my end sweeter and more poetical..."

_It was a sign of his incoming Madness, _thought Rika. _Shii-chan's dream was just the same... She remembered that her sister was pursuing her even after her death, which was impossible... While in this case he could hear the sound of a carillon which wasn't there anymore. Yes, in the end you don't need the Syndrome to get crazy, unluckily._ The blue-haired girl made then some calculation. He had had that dream when he was nine, so it had happened approximately eight or nine years ago. She had already been born, even if for not a long time, therefore it was possible that he had remembered some experience lived in another world. After all, in the starting worlds Hanyuu was able to bring her back to the moment of her birth, unlike the final ones where they restarted just from a week or two before the fated Watanagashi. But so it meant that there had been not only multiple Hinamizawa, but also multiple Serco, as well as multiple New York, multiple Paris... How many people were able to remember what they had done in the other universes, all over the world? They had to be quite numerous. Maybe Rika and Hanyuu had unwillingly created a generation of people who believed to be magicians or clairvoyants, because of that.

_No, it's not so, Rika. _Hanyuu communicated telepathically. _People have that kind of experience only if they want to change something they don't want to live anymore, and only if their will is strong enough, that's not a random gift. It has happened to Keiichi-kun, to Shii-chan, to Rena-chan... It must have happened to Gi-chan too, then. I don't exclude that someone else has been able to have that feeling of deja-vu somewhere, but their number can't be very high, on the contrary._

Rika nodded, thanking her for her explanation. These were the setbacks of traveling back in time, after all, in a lot of fictions they warn about these effects... But there was no time to think about it, now. She quickly stopped reflecting, since she wanted to hear Giancarlo while finishing the story: "Some day after the appearance of those nightmares I went to the graveyard. Alice wasn't at home, I was looking for her, and I was told she had been seen by that place. And in fact I found her there. Hiding myself behind another grave, I spied her. She was furious, I had never seen her so angry. She was hitting great-grandpa's tombstone with a stick. Exactly like the beginning of my nightmare... it was the first step towards the hell I had foreseen. I was scared, frozen by that unbearable scene. That horrible dream was becoming reality, and I was feeling like in the middle of a storm."

"What could I do? I was nine years old. Had I to tell what I had seen? But in that dream someone had informed Mom about Nee-chan's behavior, and the consequence of this fact had been their death, finally... I didn't sleep, that night, trapped in that nightmare which was turning to invade my world."

"The following morning, I thought, and I thought, and I thought... I hardly noticed to have been at school, that day, that day's lesson had no sense, for me. The teacher, and my classmates too, were ghosts for me, nothing more than minor and unessential figures with no importance. I had major matters to deal with, and so I kept on reflecting... and finally I reached a result. What was the cause of everything? Great-grandpa. Why the adults were sad? Because nobody was able to take his place. So... can you see the logical conclusion?" He smiled, as to relieve himself "I know that maybe it wasn't the best solution, but I was a little boy, and I was alone, I couldn't find out anything better. And, most of all, it had been enough to ward off that fate. I was happy for it, I didn't ask nothing more than that. Even if..."

"Even if?" asked Hanyuu.

"Even if sometimes I wonder how I have been able to dream what was about to happen. How was it possible? I supposed to be a boy like many others, in spite of these scars, but that event had definitely changed my point of view. Maybe great-grandpa was right, in the end? Was I anybody strange? Maybe..." He grinned, bitterly "Maybe what he has done to me has contaminated my body, and my soul as well. Why Alice and I are so different? Why is she so positive and joyful, unlike me? We are sister and brother, we should be similar, instead her soul is white, mine is black, hers is bright, mine is dark. Yes... the only reasonable answer is that the darkness inside that man's soul has penetrated inside mine. Yes, it must be so. Rika-chan, just some minute ago you have told me I love books exactly like him. Yes, you're right, and this is because _I am exactly like him_, a soul wandering into darkness. So he hasn't only cut my arm. He has made of me a person unable to reach happiness, a person who can only try to guard the others. Do you know about Moses? He had been able to lead the Israelites out of Egypt, far from slavery, but since the beginning he already knew he would have only watched the others while reaching the Promised Land, because God didn't allow him to join them due to his initial lack of faith. Yes, he had to stay out of it. And I too, I can only attempt to give to Alice, and to all my family, a better future, better than mine, I mean. In the end, Mii-chan, _I am the one cursed – not you._"

He sounded like nearly raving, now. His face was inexpressive, his black pupils were greatly expanded, making his hazel-colored iris nearly disappear, and making his eyes look darker than usual. But there was no anger in his words, no desire to revenge. Could he still become dangerous for the others, turning to be violent for any reason? It was improbable, fortunately. Irie's vaccine was defending him from the effects of the Syndrome, and this was an inestimable luck. Still, the darkness and the fears which were poisoning his soul from the inside had shown for the first time after years, and Rika, finally, was worried. That was the hidden side of her friend's nature, something she couldn't be pleased of.

Some moment after having stopped speaking, his look seemed to revive. His cheeks got their rosiness back, nay a slight flush started to appear. He wasn't feeling at ease, realizing what he had said, and in fact he quickly apologized: "I'm sorry, my friends. I didn't intend to scare you, or annoy you with this kind of tales. The most important thing is that you must understand you are not the first one who runs into such a difficult moment, Mii-chan. A lot of people have had to face them, and this is what makes them adult. Mature people are so because they have had both happy and unhappy experiences, and they have mentally grown up thanks to them. And if the others have been able to go over this, why a girl strong like you shouldn't?"

"I am not a strong girl."

"You are, instead. Especially compared to me. Don't deny it, you know it's true."

"But you hadn't overtaken your hard period. You don't look so, considering your own words."

He reflected for a while, then he answered: "I have taken my choices, I have done what I could. I know that I will never be entirely happy, but this is how real life works. If this was a utopia, it would be easier, we would be all happy... but here we can only try to do our best to look for a limited happiness, even if this may also mean that the level of happiness we can grab is _very _limited. Would I have been happier with different decisions? Maybe. But I don't regret what I've done. My nature... might be similar to my great-grandfather's one, but I am not obliged to do what he has done, fortunately. I can still be a better man than him."

"I see... I've understood that I shouldn't consider myself as the most unlucky girl of this world, I really must thank you for this. Really. Still... You have made your own choices, but what about mines? What was good for you can be bad for me, don't you think so? Namely, I've realized I can find a solution somehow, but I still had to deal with the hardest part of the problem... I have to find out _which is _the solution to my problem... Recognizing not to be suitable for this role, stepping aside, and leaving the leadership to somebody else? Proving to be a strong ruler, and fighting the ones who want to take my place? Which is the best choice, the one which will make the others happier? You can't answer to this, you don't know the Sonozakis as much as I do. Yes, I fear that nobody can give me a hand, about this. I have to try out myself..."

Rika and Hanyuu looked at their two friends, not sure about the state of situation. Both of them looked very tired, what had happened in the bedroom had been very stressful, and this time they did need a rest. Moreover, Mion was truly worried about the troublesome and thorby issue she was about to handle. A terrible one, with hard choices to take. But at the same time she was showing the first signs of a reaction. For a moment she had faced the bottom of the Abyss, but she had been able to get out from it. The incoming one wouldn't have been a careless period, but they were ready to fight.


	37. A broken promise

******37 – A broken promise**

_Hinamizawa, 5th February 1984_

Rika and Hanyuu exited from Mion's bedroom, and they contemplated the panorama appearing out of the window of the corridor. Trees had no leaves, animals were closed inside their warm lairs, nature was asleep, peacefully waiting for spring... but strangely they could hear a noise. What was it? It wasn't an unknown sound. It was the cry of the cicadas. How could they be there, among the plants? It was February, it was too cold for them, and there was nothing to eat for them. Rika concentrated, to hear better. The noise had disappeared, a full silence reigned over the woods and the mountains. Was just their suggestion, then? Why? It was unusual, for them, but both of them had heard it, so they couldn't find a reasonable explanation. Maybe it came from something else, which made a sound similar to the one of that insect. A machine? Two not well-defined objects, rubbing the one on the other? A recorded sound, coming from a TV, turned on by someone in one of the rooms of the Manor? Everything was possible, and they were feeling a bit uneasy due to that unexpected call, but more pressing issues were waiting for them.

As a matter of fact, the two little girls decided to go downstairs again, not asking anything else after having heard that story. Mion wanted to rest, to quietly think about what she'd better do, while Giancarlo preferred to exit the Manor, and to wait for her sister into their car. Then, the most wise choice for them was going to the main hall again, from where no further noises were coming. The council had ended some minute before, and most of his participants had already gone away. Inside the room there were still the other members of the club, together with Akane and Kasai, who were commenting what had happened.

"Finally here you are! We were waiting for you..." exclaimed Keiichi "Where have you gone?"

"Upstairs" Rika answered, abruptly.

"How is Onee?" asked Shion, who had understood where exactly they had been, even if they hadn't told her.

"Hmmm... She's quite fine, in the end. Better than how she was before going to her room, for sure. However, she was really tired, she's going to fall asleep soon, so wait some time before visiting her, if you want to."

"I will wait for dinner, then. I don't think she has had lunch, she's going to be incredibly hungry, tonight. Don't worry, she will turn up." This was what the green-haired girl replied, smiling slightly, while Alice asked: "And Nii-chan? Why isn't he here with you? Where is he, now?"

"He's... outside the Manor, having a breath of fresh air."

"I think I'd better go out and ask him to enter, then. We have major things to discuss, and I'd like..."

"No, I don't think it's a good idea, Ali-chan. Let him alone, at least for now."

"Hmm? Why?"

Rika pointed at her right arm, and Alice immediately realized what had happened. _Rika now knew_. Then, she just replied "I... I see...", and she looked to the ground, melancholically. _Yes, that story had to be painful not only for him, _Hanyuu thought. _Ali-chan must have felt guilty for what happened to him. They may have talked countless times about it, but that feeling is not something which vanishes that easily. If only Ali-chan had been born normally, her brother's arm would be normal, now... _Hanyuu, nevertheless, didn't know if the girl knew about Giancarlo's nightmares. By his words, he looked to have arranged everything alone, that day, without asking for help... But had he told anything about it later, as if he had talked with his confessor? Availing of her past experience, Hanyuu guessed no. Shion had admitted it to her sister in the past, that was true, but that boy seemed the kind of person who prefers not to talk about himself, if not forced. What had happened before was just a desperate reaction to Mion's desperation, in her opinion: he would have always kept the silence about the matter, otherwise, and nobody would have either suspected anything about the thing.

It was better not to add anything to Rika's sign, then. Of course, the others couldn't know its real meaning, so they just stared at her perplexed. However, there was no time to make any question about it, they cared about something else, and once the two liitle girls sat, they quickly changed the subject of the discussion. In fact, as soon as Rika and Hanyuu asked the final result of that meeting, Shion turned very serious, and she answered: "We have a month, an exact month starting from today. On 5th March all the family will be invited here again, and they will discuss another time about the matter. Only the members of the clan will be allowed to be present at the council this time, but every participant will tell his opinion. Luckily Onee's one is going to count more than any else, but if the whole family is against her, she won't be able anything but surrender."

"So the Furudes, the Kimiyoshis and the others won't be invited, next time... But then today's result is... nothing? Nothing came out of this?"

"It's not completely true... Do you know how long can be a month? The ones who oppose Onee will continuously look for new alliances, they will hatch some plot, the ones against the others, and against her of course, in order to get their hands on the power she is actually holding. You see, Oryou is no more here, and the fear she was able to arouse doesn't scare them anymore. Onee will have to get in touch with a lot of people, if she wants to fight... She must search for some trusted friend and ally."

"These are the side effects of power based on fear." commented Keiichi "Nobody ever discuss or remark your decisions, but once the source of fear has gone, there are no reason to obey, anymore."

"However, we can still help her" added Akane "The first thing I want to do is making some exhaustive research about aunt Megumi. I pretend to know as much as possible about her actual situation. We haven't met each other for a very long time, from our point of view she is nearly like a foreigner, now." By hearing her tone of voice, unusually annoyed for the woman, Rena guessed that those words meant also that Akane wished to reject her relative, as if she had nothing to do with her. Megumi had done something she hadn't to, the whole clan would have suffered because of that internal conflict, so there had to be a reason for her behavior, somewhere. A woman who lived far from her relatives, and who suddenly had that idea... It was strange.

"Are you suspecting that some bad companies have led astray her mind, are you?"

"It's not impossible. In this moment it's like talking about an unknown object covered by a red drape... Every description can be the truth, or not. Let's wait for more info, before making some conclusion." Akane's words sounded cold and detached, showing no affection for her relative, and Rena was not surprised of this, she was comprehending the woman's feelings.

So, when they heard Kasai making a heavy hypothesis, nobody reacted. Most of them were thinking about the same thing: "We should check even if Megumi-san is the real mandator of what happened during the Landslide Affair... She could have arranged everything to weaken Mion-sama's position."

"So she would have been the one who contacted Nabiha-san?" exclaimed Shion "It would be possible... Do you remember? Onee once said that only the Sonozaki family could avail of the money necessary for such an operation, nobody else is so wealthy... And indeed the guilty might stay inside the clan... A lot of things could be explained in this way, and she would have the motive, too..."

_Fortunately Daijiro-kun is not here, _thought Rena. _Hearing again what his father has done would have been very sorrowful for him. But then, is this really the truth? We have risked to lose everything, our houses, our village, maybe our life too... just for a power struggle? Is the leadership inside the Sonozaki so important, is it? More important than everyone's happiness? She would have got tons of money and goods, but she would have ruled over an abandoned village. How could she sleep pacifically, during the nights? If she desired more money it was enough to file a lawsuit against the others, it would have been easier. Maybe it wouldn't be fair towards her own family, but it would be a lawful path to follow, and nobody would have harmed. In that way, instead, Hinamizawa, its houses, its Shrine, this Manor too... everything might be about to become a ghost town._

The brown-haired girl looked at the others, and she noticed that Akane was staring at the walls of the hall. Exactly like the rest of the Manor, they were old, but well-kept, as the prestige of the Sonozaki family pretended. Its look was perfect... except for the point scanned by the woman, which was carrying a deep mark, likely provoked by a sword. Apparently it ruined the smoothness of that wooden beams, and furthermore it wasn't present in a hidden corner, so it was easily visible. But neither her nor Oryou had ever made that point be fixed, and they had even asked Mion to do same, because they were greatly attached to that symbol. Finally, that was a room full of happy and sad memories, still alive especially in the green-haired woman's mind. In fact, that had been the place where she had fought Oryou, to be allowed to marry the man she loved, and that mark had been the consequence of their combat. So, for most of the others that was just a flaw, an imperfection on the wall, but for her it was much more than it. A hidden memory of her past. Who had been the author of it? The mother or the daughter? Rena had been told about the story directly by Oryou, who had taken a liking to her a lot of time ago, when she was still alive. But, as well as any other boy and girl inside the hall, Rena couldn't say it, and probably neither Akane could. But it didn't matter. By the way she was looking at it, the girl could conclude that that incision reminded her good and happy memories. _Yes, if Mii-chan had to go away from the Manor, even Akane-san would be obliged to follow her, she couldn't live together with Megumi-san... And losing this house forever would be a terrible blow for her. _

This was what Rena was thinking, silent. But in that moment she saw Akane while reviving, and turning her head towards the others. She had noticed that Satoko was raising her hand, as to ask to take the floor. And in fact, once she had drawn the others' attention, she remarked that there was something which didn't work in that theory. Akane asked her what it was, and she answered:

"It's simple... If her purpose had been to attack Mion-san together with Nabiha-san, all those landslides would have begun to occur only after her promotion. Instead, there have been so many of them, little but easily noticeable, even before it. Do you remember, Rika? We had run into some of them when we were going back from school to home, and in those same days we were talking about the rites Mion-san had to perform in order to become the ruler, I am pretty sure of it."

"I see..." replied Keiichi "If she wanted to attack her in this way she would plan something coming into action _after_ that day, not _before _it... Moreover, settling all that deployment to take power... it seems exaggerated, to me. I know we are talking about all the goods belonging to the Sonozaki family, an extremely considerable fortune, but there are much more convenient ways to get them."

"Maybe she already knew about the ceremony." commented Hanyuu "So she might have settled the arrangements before it, to make sure everything was ready, and not to do it in a hurry. You know, that is not something you can finish in few time."

"I don't think so." told Akane "My mother hadn't said it to anybody but me and my husband, and I can ensure that nobody else was aware of it, until the evening of the announcement. Otherwise we would be talking about a severe security leak, and Kasai wouldn't be pleased of it, isn't it true, Kasai?" The middle-aged man didn't answer, immobile as he had been taught during all that time in their service, and just grumbling as sign of confirm.

"But was Mii-chan really her target? Maybe she wanted just to dethrone the ruler of the Sonozaki family, no matter her name was Oryou or Mion. Together with Nabiha-san, she had planned those landslides to harm Onibaba, and then, when she has seen Mii-chan was the new chief, she had aimed at her, but using the same schedule."

"No, Rika-chan, it can't be that. Accusing Sonozaki Oryou to be a dud... It would have never worked, that would have been madness. Of course, she might have changed the words to use, claiming for example that her sister was too old, but was she able to face her? She had already lost once, so I do think it's not so. And she would have had no allies, in that case, everyone was still scared of Batcha, despite her age and her state of health."

"So she could have arranged some modify to their plan, when she had been told about the promotion of the new heiress."

"Huh? What do you mean, Ali-chan?"

"Mine is just a conjecture... But imagine that Megumi was drawing up something against Oryou-san, and that suddenly she's obliged to change it because of the last news... It would take time to think about something suitable... And in fact we have seen her here in the Manor only two months after those facts..."

"Hmmm... Too complicated." replied Satoko, after thinking about that eventuality for a few seconds "If you were right, they would have postponed the whole plan to some time later. Namely, the Landslide Affair itself would have occurred later, like early in the beginning of the new year, for example. Delaying only the second part of the operation is a nonsense, in my humble opinion, you only give to your opponents the chance to get ready and defend themselves."

"Yes, quite so. I'm not good at being entangled inside these twisted plots, I fear. I should leave this task to you, you are much more skilled than me. Maybe Nii-chan would like more this kind of challenge, but I don't mind. I will ask for his opinion at home."

"But at least does anyone know if she was among the crowd, that day at the prefecture? Did anyone see her? By using a post fitting the purpose, it would have been easier for her to check the situation, in that way."

"Yes, but her presence would have been strange. Everybody knows her misanthropy, it's something she has developed as time went by, after she had left the Manor. She couldn't stand all those people, she would have got a panic attack, there... As far as I know, actually she loves staying in her house, or in little rooms, far from the other unfortunate human beings who populate this vale of tears." Shion grinned "She just hates open spaces... how do they call it..."

"Agoraphoby." answered Akane.

Shion turned at her: "Agoraphoby, you say? Good to know, thank you very much Mom. Of course, we can't exclude her implication in all that mess, she could have sent one or two servants of her, you have heard her some minute ago. But since we don't have any evidence, we can't charge her of anything, and then it seems we must proceed cautiously. So, the problem now is thinking about a strategy we can suggest to Onee. What should she do? Probably a lot of relatives will come for advice, to be suggested about what they should do... Yes, probably the ones who are tied to our old traditions are going to be on our side."

"Do you think so, do you?"

"Yes... Willingly or not, she has been declared the ruler of the family with all the official blessings, and driving her away would be something totally new. There are a lot of people who wouldn't accept any distortion, for all the tea in China. You probably know how they reason: they love so much things which go like always, and a sudden change might bring misfortunes, Oyashiro-sama's anger and so on, from their point of view."

"So, this time, we don't have to change a wrong usage." concluded Rika, smiling "On the contrary we have to make sure that nothing changes. Is it what you mean, Shii-chan?" She closed her eyes, and she exclaimed "Nippa!"

"Y-yes, you're right, Rika-chan..."

In the end, it was the opposite of the case when they had to rescue Satoko: that time they had to attack the other people, the Council, the Center, Oryou... Now instead they had to defend themselves and Mion from an external attack. Rika stopped smiling, trying to take the logical conclusions from what she had just heard. They actually weren't able to discover what exactly it was, but there had to be some link between Nabiha and Megumi, even Ouka had said there was someone else behind him, and two frontal attacks in such a short period can't be a coincidence. What had she said, precisely? She endeavored to remember. What she had said, at the Saiguden...

_"If so, I would have already lost my war. No, I had... a friendly partnership with another man, _

_who has guided Nabiha towards that unlucky undertaking."_

_Another man? _She exclaimed to herself._ Yes, she had used those words, she didn't refer to a woman, but to a man. So is Megumi innocent? Or is she just like another puppet controlled by someone? Or what else? Maybe I shouldn't trust Ouka's words, in the end she had declared to be our arch-enemy, and she could have spoken to us just to misdirect us, or to make us confused... No, we just need more info. Let's wait for what they are able to gather about that woman, and our deduction will be more precise._

"So we can have already some idea about who is going to fight us, and about who is going to support us... Could you already know who will be on our side, Shion? It would be a very precious help."

"Not precisely, I fear. You should ask Onee for this, she knows the most unconfessable secrets of the clan, Batcha has revealed to her much more things than to anyone else, and probably she could describe exactly most of the branches of the family, their composition, their attitude toward the Mother House, et cetera... On the contrary, I don't know many of them, even if I can say that, for example, Aunt Yono should go with us... However, all in all, there are a lot of them who think highly of her, I suppose it's the majority of the kinsfolk, so let's avoid to become so pessimistic, now. Indeed, she will have to talk with plenty of them, it will be a tiring job, but..."

"I'm sure that Mion can make it." Akane interrupted her abruptly "Rather, there is something else I want to discuss about. Shion, shouldn't you step aside, now? This is not your role."

Her daughter turned at her, once again, but she didn't looked surprised due to that invitation. She already knew the words her mother was about to say: "When you have been accepted here, you had made a promise to your grandmother: you had sworn that you wouldn't have ever meddled with familiar matters. You would have lived in Hinamizawa ignoring this side of the Sonozakis' world, you would have never said or imposed your opinion about any of the issues your sister has to care. And in exchange for this you were allowed to live here with your sister and your family, in spite of all the past traditions which recommended that this house had to be lived by as few people as possible. So, have you forgotten your pledge?"

"No, I haven't" Shion immediately answered "But I had no choice. It has not been the only promise I have done to someone, and in this case I had to choose between two of them. I couldn't avoid breaking one of them."

Akane scanned her, as if she was trying to read the truth in her daughter's eyes. The green-haired girl simply was not able to lie, and her mother knew that. Few seconds were enough to realize she was sincere, and to have an idea about the subject of the other promise.

"What have you said to your sister?" she asked, in fact.

"That I would have never left her alone. As her... younger sister it was my duty to assist her as much as I can do, I've always cared about our traditions less than what I did about Onee. During the period I was having those strange dreams, she had been my priceless personal nurse, she had helped me, she had given me the courage to react... You know, without her help I wouldn't have ever been able to fit in as part of this group, and of this village as well. Otherwise, I would have lived separately, alone in Okinomiya, distrusting all of you, exactly like what aunt Megumi has done. Yes, I may even say I can understand what her feelings are, and what they have been in the past. I don't share them, that's sure, but I can see how she has been able to go that far, and why."

"So you're saying it's not her fault... Do you think your grandmother and I could make more to help her?" There was no anger in Akane's words, only a grain of disappointment and regret. And in fact Shion answered calmly:

"I don't know, I wasn't there to judge you. It's something you should know better than anyone else, Mom. I'm only saying that my destiny would have been the same as Megumi's one, without Onee. Not loved by most of the family, deprived of the others' fondness, isolated, sent to live in another town... Yes, I would have been unhappy, exactly like her. What's more, unhappy and alone... Without Onee's blood Satoshi-kun would be still in that basement, below the ground floor of the Clinic... Yes, I owe her everything, that's why the promise I gave to her is infinitely worthier than any other one I have made, and than any other one I will ever make."

Rika smiled, clearly pleased. It was maybe the first time Shion talked publicly about her sister in such an endearing way. They all knew there was a strong bond between the two twins, but both of them were used to hide it, pretending they spent their time teasing each other. It was an open secret, but they were happy to live together so, so the others didn't mind.

"However" Shion continued, realizing that what she had just said was a bit embarrassing "It's not like my aim is to replace Onee, I am not planning to become the ruler. Both of us do recognize that the choice of the rightful heiress has been taken the day when they drew a tattoo on her back, and we have no regrets about it. I am doing this for a selfless purpose, which is giving a providential hand to that young woman" she grinned again, finally "Who wouldn't be just able to make it alone..."

"Offending her is just like offending yourself." Satoshi dared to reply "Weren't you the same?"

"Satoshi-kun!" she shouted, beet-red, while the others laughed noisily, before discussing the last details.

…

Smoking a cigar is a pleasant activity, if you can do it alone, sat on your armchair and calm in your living room. And it is even more than that, if you have good news. A letter had been made slip under the door of his house, and, as soon as it had been seen, it was opened, in order to make a short message be read:

_Tomorrow after 9:00 PM_

_141, Kabenochi Road, 4th floor._

Might it be a trap? No, it couldn't be a trap, they would have everything to lose now, with an insensate gesture. They had to react earlier than that, if they wished to. By that moment, they had fallen into a mousetrap they couldn't escape from, and they could do nothing but obeying diligently, in order to survive. So, he would have gone there personally, he didn't trust any other else. Maybe that apartment was about to be empty, and nobody would have welcomed him, but it didn't matter, the most important thing was that he already knew what he was about to find there. Handing the piece of paper to the one next to him and turning off the butt of the cigar, he commented satisfied:

"Have you seen? That little hearth had been very useful... They won't cause us trouble anymore, from now on."

Everything was running fine, and his increased self estimate suggested him to take another cigar, which he did immediately.


	38. The Edge People No Longer Cross

******38 – ****The Edge People No Longer Cross **

_Hinamizawa, 11st February 1984_

The one which was about to begin was the typical cold morning of February, and frost covered all the paths and roads in Hinamizawa. But, in spite of this, two green-haired girls were walking, through their usual path from the Manor to school, challenging the very low temperature. Wrapped inside their warm and comfortable coats, both of them were quite thoughtful, absorbed by what they were reading on the sheet of paper they had been given before leaving home. On it, Kasai had personally written every thing he had discovered about Megumi Sonozaki.

It wasn't a long reading. It was a single sheet, on which there were only a few lines, written by hand with black ink. A very neat summary. After all, there wasn't really much, about her. After leaving the rest of the family, she had got married with a middle-aged businessman, who guaranteed her a wealthy existence. But there were no interesting info about her recent past, and about her husband's one. Their names were not reported anywhere, there weren't any particular news involving them. and theirs looked just like ordinary lives. So, what had occurred to her? Why Megumi had suddenly changed her mind, asking for Mion to leave the headship of the family? Something had to have happened, but they couldn't say what exactly.

However, that was deceptive, and Shion couldn't refrain from commenting. "It seems that Kasai's work has been useless, when all is said and done, Onee."

"No, it's not... You shouldn't be so few respectful of the others' care, Shion. However, there's something we can say thanks to this."

"And what is it? What are you chewing over, now?"

"Frankly, I don't know yet. I should take some more time to think about it."

Shion preferred not to insist, Mion wouldn't have changed her mind. In short, the twins already knew what they were about to do, in the following weeks. The ruler of the Sonozaki clan had reflected about it during the past days, and her meditation had come to a conclusion. In fact, once they reached the school, they immediately went to Chie's office, since they needed to talk with her with urgency. In the previous two days they had been absent from school, they had to justify, but that was not the only purpose they went there for. After opening the door and greeting lovingly their teacher, the pony-tailed girl approached her, and she started to speak:

"Sensei, I wanted to inform you that I've decided to embark on this battle, and to fight to save my role inside the Sonozaki family. I do think it's the right thing to do, now. But, in order to do that, I am going to be fully busy, devoting myself in doing everything I can to fulfill this task. Namely... I can't go to university. This choice forces me not to give time enough to study, and then I would never be able to get ready for my admission exam. I want to thank you for everything you have done for me, for all your efforts... But I have to ask you not to give me other math exercises, to do at school or at home. I wouldn't have time to do any of them at home, and moreover I wouldn't be motivated to finish them, they would be useless, since my studies will definitely end in less than two months. Thank you again, Chie-sensei... but I have made my choice, and I have to do a little sacrifice to save something bigger."

The teacher looked at her, quite disappointed. She had recognized her good faith, but she was thinking that it was a pity. Mion wasn't a sharp student, but she was a lofty girl, and probably she would have been able to overtake those difficulties... But life never goes like how you expect, and those unforeseen events were calling for her presence. Chie sighed, showing to accept her decision, and then she turned at Shion: "And you, instead? What are you planning to do?"

"Neither Shion will attend university" answered Mion "But this is not a surprise, we have known it for a long time. She has never wanted to, you have already been told too, Sensei. I suppose she will stay in Hinamizawa after the end of this school year."

"I see..." In the end, Mion wanted to study hard because she wanted to learn as much as she could, in order to use that knowledge to improve everyone's life inside the village. Shion had never had that stimulus, and so she wasn't so interested in school. And her bad memories about her life in St. Lucia Academy had influenced her, furthermore. All she wanted was living with Satoshi, and in the meanwhile helping her friends, when necessary.

"Well" Chie replied "I suppose you are going to study only what is obligatory to finish this last year of yours... I won't say I'm happy of this, because I am not, but if you think it's the best choice to take, I won't oppose. At least, I would like to ask you to help me sometimes with the youngest kids, then. I always need one more help, here... Do you agree?"

Both of the twins nodded, so the teacher added: "Good. But now you should join the others, inside the classroom. They are waiting for you." Shion nodded, and then she left the office, followed by her sister.

"Well, we have accomplished the hardest part of the day." commented the pony-tailed girl "Now let's have something more pleasant. Are you ready for it?"

The other one nodded, while going next to the door of the classroom, to make it slide. Inside the room everything hushed, they could hear it from there. It was strange, extremely strange. They were used to the infernal racket coming from there, usually provoked by Keiichi and Satoko. That morning, instead, everything was silent, as if everyone was waiting for something, before daring to open their mouth.

The door was opened, slowly...

"HAPPY BIRTHDAY, GIRLS!"

Keiichi's joyful shout filled the room, and the others enthusiastically followed his example, congratulating with the two twins. Yes, they were waiting for something. They were waiting for her arrival.

"Tsk, this old lady is getting _really_ old." replied the pony-tailed girl. "How old am I, now? 18, if I can count."

"If you were in Europe you would be a major girl." exclaimed Alice, while laughing "Here instead you have still to wait a couple of years."

"It's just the same. In this hard period we have to behave like adults, so we already are adults. Conventions decided by the various governments won't make us sager than what we already are."

"You're right" answered Keiichi "But majority always carries its own glamor. Driving your car, voting... it's just like an initiatory rite. You do feel alike an older woman, after you reach it."

"Well..." she commented, skeptical "Hard to say that. There are dozens of members older than us, inside our family... And we'll have to deal with them, soon. That day, they will see us as young and immature people, still."

"That's their fault, then. Presuming that younger women can't teach them about something is a pure self-conceit."

"You should say it to them, I fear." She sat on her place, and then she opened her bag, taking a large rolled sheet of paper from it, and exclaiming: "Or at least you should make it clear to the ones reported here."

Keiichi observed the sheet, got curious. At first sight, it was a sort of family tree, and even if there wasn't their family name anywhere it could be nothing but the Sonozakis' one. On it, as the headline said, there were all the names of the living members, but the most interesting thing was that a lot of them had been marked with different colors: most of them had been underlined with a green highlighter, but there were other marks, blue, violet and red; finally, some name had no marks at all.

"You'd better to add a key, or something which explains the reason of all those colors..." concluded Keiichi, while finishing to examine the document and raising his head towards the pony-tailed girl.

"Kei-chan, that's not so difficult... The names with no marks belong to the little children of the family, who actually haven't the power to make decisions, and who will have no say in the matter. The green marks show who _probably_ is going to be on our side, while the red ones point at who will be on aunt Megumi's one. The blue ones refer to who is still undecided, and to who doesn't care about the name of the ruler."

"And the violet ones?"

"Give me a moment to finish to explain, please! They are the ones who had declared to be on our side, but whom we don't trust. In their case, we have founded suspicions that they are double crossing us. There are not a lot of them, fortunately, but it's vital to immediately recognize them. And we have to check everyone: knowing someone's alignment doesn't allow us to conclude his brothers' ones, for example. Feuds between members of the same family often play off father against son, or mother against daughter..."

"Yep, I can read the difference of colors even inside family units, indeed." commented Satoko "Anyways, this is a very detailed map. You have gathered a lot of information in these few days."

"That's why we have stayed at home, in these days. We have spent our time phoning the others, while our mother gave her point of view, and Kasai made some research about them, too. You know, these matters are always full of intrigues and traps, you must be ready to face them. Someone may claim to help you, and in reality he's betraying you, acting behind your back."

"Understood... However, let's forget this for now, we have a lesson to make start, and today is a special one, we must celebrate!"

"Rena agrees" the brown-haired girl said "When school is over even Daijiro-kun will join us, she has promised it to Rena, and if we are all together we will have fun..."

"I'm sorry to be a killjoy, but I fear we can't do it as much as you want. This afternoon this old lady has to leave you alone and go away, and you should be able to understand why."

"I suppose so. Another boring meeting to have a better view of the situation."

"Bullseye." she sighed, showing not to be enthusiast to have to go there "I will inform Chie-sensei when she arrives here, I had forgotten telling her about this, before. But now, let's go to our seats, she will come in a few moments..."

…

Mion and Shion's poor interest in what they were writing that day became soon manifest, and all of their friends immediately realized it. In more than an hour, they hardly had completed scribbling the first two of the twelve pages they had been given as work for that morning. The others blank sheets had stayed there, leaned on their desks and untouched by their pens, as if the girls couldn't either notice them. The reason was obvious. Those exercises were now lacking of a real goal, in their sight, which made them completely unmotivated. Maybe they were able to do them, or rather they were not, and what they had already written was just full of mistakes, but it didn't matter, especially to the two of them. A couple of times, Shion had even stood up and gone to the desks where Giancarlo and Alice were sat by, to see what they were doing, and to read the books they had been given that morning. It was not that strange, it was well known that the girl loved literature much more than math, but leaving her exercises in the middle was something she had never done, despite her usually rebelling attitude. Therefore, the only thing Chie could really do to raise their spirit was matching each of them with a kid, begging them to help them with their tasks, exactly like what she had told them inside the office.

Fortunately the hours ran fast, and lunch break arrived. The club couldn't wait for it, and they steeply moved their desks, to form a large circle and celebrate worthily the twins' birthday. A huge cake mysteriously appeared, prepared by Rena and Satoko the previous day, and Keiichi didn't stop singing birthday songs, getting even quite annoying. Fortunately, Rika soon blocked him with a bucket full of water, falling from the roof, which make him literally bite his tongue and scream like a maniac. The school was still full of Satoko's traps, and more than anyone else she was aware of the most of them, due to the fact she had collaborated to arrange them, in the past. Yes, one day Keiichi should fund a reclamation of the building, if he wished to survive there.

However, the tasty cake vanished quite quickly, and so the desks were put back in the usual place. But since they had still an hour before Mion left (and before the start of their afternoon lesson), they decided to play a game.

"Are we anticipating it? I see... Mion-san has to go away earlier than usual, so this is the best choice. And however... we haven't had an activity for a long time, so these are great news!" commented Satoko, enthusiast.

"I agree, but which game are you proposing?" asked Satoshi. "The Old Maid card game?"

"Again? I'm tired of that! Yours is not passion, it's obsession!" protested Alice, snorting "Why don't we try something else, one time? For example... Well, let's see..." she inflated her own jowl, absorbed, desperately looking for something which didn't involve those damn cards.

"Why don't we play _Ronin Mawashi_?" suggested Rena "It had come to Rena's mind some day ago, and we haven't played it for a long time. It would be nice, it would be."

"And what is it?" asked the Italian girl, touching neurotically her light brown hair. It took some minute for her to be told that it was the Japanese name of the Pen Spinning. You take a pen in your hand, and after a moment of concentration you have to make it spin with speed and dexterity, to create the most imaginative tricks and amaze the opponents. In this case, a jury would have decided who was the best at moving it, while the loser would have been subjected to the usual punishment.

"But we should find a jury, then." commented Alice "We can't judge ourselves, it wouldn't be fair, and there might be the most various swindles and cons..."

"Now you are forgetting that we have a lot of judges, here." answered Keiichi, pointing at the other kids inside the classroom, the ones who theoretically didn't belong to the club. "We have already here eight-nine impartial members of the committee, can't you see it?"

"And however" added the pony-tailed girl "You shouldn't worry about it. In this discipline brain doesn't count, a deft hand will be much more useful... So I have half a mind about who will have to wear this, during the trip to home..."

"Thank you very much for your faith towards my ability..." grumbled Giancarlo, annoyed due to the fact she was staring at him, while pronouncing those words. But he was also curious to see what she was looking for, since he could see her bustling next to Chie's chair.

The girl grinned, pretending not to have heard him, and abruptly she took a giant bear costume hidden God knows how behind the teacher's desk. It had been brought by Satoko, who had a fondness for those animals, and she had devised a new experimental way to conceal it, without that Chie-sensei could have either a suspicion about its presence. Maybe under the desk itself, a secret passage? From there, the others couldn't say it, but it had no importance, for now. And so, after having strenuously avoided that Rena brought the costume home, the activity started.

It was Keiichi who led off the dance. His white pen began soon to fly, to hover in the air light like the feather of a swan. Its movement was incredibly fast, but at the same time he could control it perfectly, as if it was the sixth finger of his hand. He hadn't unlearned how to play that game, after all that years, and the others' admiration was the logical result.

"Well done" commented the pony-tailed girl, when he concluded his performance "It really seems that you won't finish last, at least for today..."

"Thank you for your compliments... That was something which has always fascinated me. I had practiced for lots of evenings, when I was in Tokyo. It was a training made just for personal satisfaction, however, I have never participated to any challenge, at school." His level of self-satisfaction increased when the jury gave him the highest score. And so, as however expected, nobody was able to emulate him. Shion, Mion, Alice and Rena made decent tricks, appreciated by the audience, but none of them was so deft as Keiichi.

Now it was Satoshi's turn. He was a bit uneasy, and in fact, as soon as his hand grabbed the pen, it started trembling. He would have preferred by far to have his bat in his own hands, that new genre of trial slightly scared him. Shion mentally wished him good luck, but what those first signs made foretell punctually happened: after a pair of elementary tricks, the pen slipped away from his fingers, and it fell to the ground. Since the rules clearly said that this eventuality ratified the end of his performance, Satoshi had to sit down on his place, a bit deceived and cheered by Satoko, and he was given a very low score. It was nearly impossible to get a worse one, for the ones who still had to exhibit. In fact, Rika and Hanyuu just limited themselves to control the spin of the pen, keeping it securely in their hands. They did nothing special, but their final score was higher than Satoshi's one, and this was enough.

Finally, it fell to Giancarlo's lot to end that challenge. Like Rika and Hanyuu, he had only not to commit stupid mistakes, and in that way he would have avoided the last position. He was quite clumsy at that sort of game, but in the end he was aware of what to do, it was absolutely enough to ke-

Betrayal. Just before starting his exhibition, a sudden strike reached his forearm, making the pen falling from his hand. He quickly turned at the direction the blow came from, and he saw a ponytail, and a grinning face.

"What kind of joke is it?" he asked to her.

"Well... I thought you would be so cute, with that costume on. So, I've made sure that your result becomes lower than Satoshi-kun's one. Do you remember the rules? Pen on the floor means show concluded."

"But I have neither begun!"

"It doesn't matter. Nobody will dare contradicting me, and you should already be able to see the score you are given." Since he hadn't done either a trick, unlike Satoshi, it was zero, the lowest score possible. Unavoidably, he had lost.

At once, the costume was triumphally taken from its place, and it was put next to the boy's desk, to remind him his future destiny. So, accomplishing the purpose she had fixed in advance, the pony-tailed girl started laughing joyfully, regardless of the fact that in the meanwhile Giancarlo was scanning her.

…

"Hauuu! I want to bring him hoooommme! I will place him just next to Kenta-kun!"

"It's not possible, I'm sorry." answered Alice "He needs too much care, he can't be placed everywhere, he's a delicate pet."

Under that costume, Giancarlo was suffocating, and the holes next to his eyes were by far too little. The road to home was about to be hard: "At-at-at least we are on February, otherwise I would have roasted! It's abnormally hot, inside here!"

"Don't blame us for this" answered Satoko "It's normal to suffer from heat, with a costume on, and especially with _that _one on. And moreover, isn't carnival nearing? You should be happy for this." She didn't add anything else. While finishing speaking, she noticed that a car was coming. Who was inside it? Mion had already greeted the others, grabbing her bag, and she had already left school several hours ago. In fact, Kasai had arrived to take Mion away, with a car by far more luxurious than that white one.

With a last grinding halt, the car stopped, and a panting figure got breathlessly out of it.

"Da-Daijiro-kun!" exclaimed Rena, shocked by the boy's exhausted face.

"I... I..." he puffed, catching his breath "I made it... I had promised to... to come here this afternoon... that's why... that's why I am here..."

"But... but why are you so strained? You look so pale, Rena is worried, she is."

"It's... a long story. This afternoon the bus I was sat on had suddenly broken down, and my bike has had a flat tire since the day before yesterday, so I had to take my father's car. Dad of course can't use it at the moment, so I borrow it only for today, he won't mind. But the way to Hinamizawa was blocked, a landslide had obstructed the passage."

"A landslide? Another one?" that event reminded sad memories.

"Well..." he got visibly embarrassed, recalling to his mind who had been the author of the previous ones "Yes, that's the truth. So I had to take another path, but I ran out of gasoline, I had to walk for half an hour to reach the nearest gas station. And I had forgotten to lock all the doors, so when I came back I found two thieves who were trying to steal my car, and I had to fight to defend myself. They made these grazes, but in the end they had to run away. However, it's nothing serious, I'm fine, really, so I could arrive here and fulfilling my promise."

"Indeed, this hasn't been your lucky day... Please, remind me not to go anywhere together with you, I could seriously risk my life." commented Satoko, sneering.

"But weren't you 16?" exclaimed Keiichi "You had told me so the first time we have met, if I am right... How can you drive a car, then?"

"I've given my own word to Rena-san, and these conventions are just worthless, once you are careful enough and once you have been taught how to drive conscientiously. Or are you rather claiming I am an immature person?"

_Immature, no. But bizarre, surely... _replied Rika sarcastically, of course in a low voice not to make herself been heard._ You have just risked to be put under arrest because of a foolishness._

In the meanwhile, Keiichi was staring at Daijiro, skeptical "You exactly look like Mion, now. She had said the same thing, before, about the uselessness of social conventions... It must be the way they educate children, hereabout."

"Rena doesn't want you to quarrel, now!" shouted suddenly the girl, blushing but resolute to nip that discussion in the bud "Rena is happy to see you're here too, so what can we do, now? I'd really like to-"

"Sorry to interrupt you, but ho-honestly I had promised you to accompany you at home, yesterday, and that was what I wanted to, my mother wished to have a talk with your father and you. She want to know you, and she's already waiting for you inside your house."

"Yes, we should all go home, it's getting late" replied Giancarlo "And I can't wait to take all these things off. Better eye out than always ache, don't you think so?"

"Hmmm, but you're so cute... I don't mind what they say, I want to bring you home..."

Yes, it was time to go, especially to avoid being kidnapped by some raving mad girl. So, Giancarlo, Alice, Satoshi, Shion and Satoko took a way to go back home, while Keiichi, Rena, Rika, Daijiro and Hanyuu took the other one. It was better to choose different paths, Rena's attention towards that costume might become extremely dangerous for who was wearing it. And, as a matter of fact, that kind of prospect was so funny that the former of the two groups started talking about that subject.

"Ha ha ha... She's funny, when she acts so, but today Rena-san is just like the usual girl we know." exclaimed Satoko "Or, more exactly, she's the one we knew before all this story began..."

"Are you saying this is a sort of reaction, Satoko?"

The little girl nodded towards her brother, and Alice commented: "I agree with you, guys... she's trying to go back to a normal life, free from that kind of problems. It's quite reasonable, in my opinion, and this is a sign of strength. Moreover, after all, if we wait for that boy's arrest, we may await till the cows come home, and this is not a good idea."

"Ara ara, you don't trust your older sister, do you, Ali-chan?"

"It's not like I don't believe in Flavia's ability... But you should know how these situations end: the wanted man definitely disappears, and nobody is able to see him alive. Maybe we will find only his corpse, one day, at the bottom of the river, or in the most impenetrable areas of the forest around Hinamizawa, or maybe we won't run into his remains at all, after his death. Past and present chronicles are full of examples similar to this, it's enough to read some newspaper, or some magazine, to make you convinced."

They went on with the subject for a while, discussing about imaginary tales and real stories which they found to be similar to her friend's one, until they had to separate, arrived at a crossroads. They were about to greet each other, but Satoko noticed that Giancarlo was trying to take off one of the sleeves of the costumes.

"Hey, you can't do that! You must keep it until you come to your home! This was the penalty, and you had accepted its terms, before playing!"

"I know it, don't worry! I am going to wear it again immediately, but first I have to do something. If I don't get rid of the sleeve of the costume I can't take this in my hand." He was now holding a little piece of paper, and carelessly he put it inside one of Shion's pocket, who had stayed immobile, caught unawares and indecisive about how to react. Then, he added: "Be careful, young girl, read it only when you're at home, if someone discovers this message before then you will have to face some serious problem, understood?"

Then, as promised, he fixed up the sleeve, and he quickly went away, leaving the others consumed by their curiosity.

…

"You haven't explained me what there was on that piece of paper, yet..." Alice asked him, when they arrived at home.

"Just wait for a little more time, Nee-chan, she will be here soon..."

"She? Are you talking about Shii-chan?" Alice looked at him askance. What was the sense of it? Her brother had never been that mysterious, and he looked inexplicably amused. There had to be a reason, somewhere.

She wanted to find out the truth, but she hadn't time to think about it. While she was taking from the shelf the necessary pots to prepare dinner, she heard the doorbell ringing, and she asked Giancarlo to open the door. The boy obeyed, and once turned the knob a shadow quickly moved inside, and his sight was covered by a white background.

"Now explain me what this mean!" a voice shouted. Alice went to the entrance to look at what was happening, and she saw Shion pushing the sheet of paper on her brother's nose, quite bothered.

"Shii-chan, what's the matter..." she asked, and then her attention focused on what she was holding "This is what Nii-chan had handed you before... May I read it, please?" Shion assented, and Alice took the paper, reading the following words:

_Your birthday is not finished yet, Mii-chan._

"And that's all? What a banality, this is unworthy of you, Nii-chan. Of course this day is not finished, at the Manor they must have prepared something special, but..." Alice's voice choked inside her throat "Wait... _Mii-chan?_" She stared at the message, keeping it stuck to her nose, astounded, and then at the green-haired girl in front of her. Unquestionably, that was Shion's look. Her hair left down, the yellow ribbon tied on the back of her head... How could be she Mion? But, if she was not, what was the reason of that instinctive reaction by her?

"You can ask it to her by yourself." answered her brother, removing all doubt. "She will answer that I've not mistaken her identity."

"Is... is it true, Shi... Mii-chan?"

The girl didn't reply, and Alice sighed: "Hmmm... on second thoughts, you were right, today's _Shion _was slightly too silent, compared to her standards_. _But from here to claiming they have switched their clothes... How have you been able to..."

"It's Shion's fault, I'm sure of that." replied Mion, clenching her fists nervously "She wanted to avoid Satoshi's loss, by every possible means. And since Kei-chan had already made his performance before him, you were the only one she could really sabotage. Damn Shion, had you really to do that? Satoshi-kun is not a baby who always needs her assistance, you mustn't be so over-protective. Nothing would have occurred to him, if he had had to wear that costume. He would have survived, after the end of the punishment!" As every good club leader, she was starting to learn her subordinate's thinking process.

"So it's true... And then have you been Satoshi-kun's girlfriend for one day? Was it fine, for your sister?"

"Satoshi-kun was aware of our switch, don't worry... He's the only one who can distinguish the two of us. At least he's the only one unless that idiot makes it clear to everyone."

"Well, I hadn't made it, so don't be so rude with her..." exclaimed the Italian girl. "However, why have you done such a thing, today?"

"It was Shion's present for me. You know, this period is hard for me, and she is doing her best to make it lighter. In the last days I had to phone to everyone I knew, to talk with them, to be informed about every possible and imaginable thing... It's terribly tiring and stressful, you have to spend all your day in this way, without any break, any moment of relax. So she had offered to take my place at today's meeting, and at the same time she wanted to show me something."

"What?"

"She wanted me to see how much you were attentive towards me. How much you were worried, but at the same time how much you were ready to give me a hand. You know, you are told about it tons of times, but you are never completely convinced, you always fear it's not true. But from an external point of view, it's much easier to notice it. I will heartily thank her, when she goes back home, discoveries like this one make you feel enormously better."

Alice smiled, then she asked: "But so... what Shion had said to Chie-sensei in your stead... Was it true?"

"You have heard it, then, I suppose that someone was behind the door. Well, we can say that Rena's ears still work perfectly..." she sadly smiled "However, yes, it's true, it would be senseless otherwise, claiming a thing and doing the opposite... Not going to university, as I wanted, will be a painful sacrifice, but I can't do anything with it. Don't you agree with me?"

"I see..." she answered, mortified for her friend's destiny "But so why have you come here so hastily? Just to make sure he hadn't given you that message by mistake?"

Mion shook her head, and Giancarlo explained to her sister what she meant with that sign: "Once you write words like those, you presume that another surprise is going to arrive, and I suppose that Mii-chan wanted to discover it as soon as possible, am I right? Well, you've made the right choice, we'd better not to move that thing too much, it's terribly fragile." Neither Alice nor Mion knew what he was talking about, but he invited them to wait a minute, then he run upstairs towards his bedroom, where he took a case from under his bed, and while holding it he went back to the living room, avoiding rough movements and leaning delicately the whole thing on the table.

"Here it is" he said "Of course I'll help you to bring it at home, you would have found it at the Manor, if this pleasant drawback hadn't occurred. Please open it, this is my present for you."

"For me?" Mion replied, pointing at herself "Have you forgotten that today is not only my birthday? Poor Shion, hadn't you prepared anything for her?"

"Don't paint me like an insensible! I couldn't give it to Shii-chan, for a simple reason. This present is not an ordinary one, and I can give it only to you because it's something which already belongs to you."

"Hmmm? And what..."

"Open the case, and you'll see what I mean."

She did it, and she couldn't say anything because of the emotion. It was... a doll. No, it was _her _doll. The one she had accidentally crashed on the floor at the Manor, nearly a month before, and now it was there, in front of her, back in one piece again. Yes, she couldn't get wrong, it was her doll, she could recognize it among a thousand others.

"You see now why I've said those words?" Giancarlo explained, glad to see her reaction "You had told me to throw it away, that day, but I did think it was a pity, so I picked up all the fragments, and I've asked to repair it. You know, in Krinoto there is a well-known doll store, Keresana-san had suggested me to go there. It hadn't been easy, they told me, but they were able to fix it. You can see it, it really looks like a new doll, now." Mion lifted the hem of the dress of the doll, and neither there she could see any crack, or any sign which proved it had been destroyed by her angry rush, in the past. But it was her doll, there were no doubts about it.

"But when you have brought it there?" asked Alice "I don't remember to have ever seen you going back home with this suitcase."

"Because you were away, too, that day. Do you remember the Sunday when you and the other girls went to do shopping?"

"Which one? Oh, I see... When we had admired all those wedding clothes, I've got it. Yes, you hadn't gone to Okinomiya with us, that day... But- " she approached him, whispering in his ear "It must have been quite expensive... Maybe a new doll would have been cheaper."

The boy shook his head, and he waved slightly his hand as to say it didn't matter, then he talked to Mion: "I hope you can understand the real meaning of this present. Once you had told me you were a disaster, didn't you? Well, when you do something wrong, you can always fix it. Always. There are no disasters impossible to redress. It goes for dolls, but also for everything else."

"But in this case it was me who had broken the doll, and it was you who has repaired it..."

Mion's remark made him dumbfounded. The truth was that he hadn't thought about a good speech, and he had used the wrong words, as usual. Anyways, he speedily tried to right his mistake: "I-it's just the same, have I to be the one who reminds you the power of friendship and of all that stuff you were always blathering about?" Alice grinned, and he was forced to go on "Consider this as... as a way to help you to face your life positively. Have you ever read Dickens' book _A Christmas Carol_? Don't tell me you don't know the plot, they have made dozens of movies and cartoons about it... So, if we make a comparison, you are like Scrooge, this doll is the Ghost of Past, while your friends are the Ghost of Present, and... and..." his talk started to flounder. He didn't know with whom he could match the Ghost of Future.

"Maybe my family could portray it?" suggested then Mion, noticing his hesitancy "Megumi-san, in particular, who is the one I will have to face by next month?"

"No..." he answered, scratching his own head "Inside the story, the three Spirits are good entities who try to help the protagonist, and Megumi-san surely doesn't want to... No, the truth is that this metaphor doesn't work at all, it is my fault, I fear. Let's just ignore it." he concluded, embarrassed by the two girls' unavoidable laugh.

Alice was happy, however, glad to see him behaving so actively. Yes, maybe he might have informed her about what he was doing, and the doll would have been given as a present by the both of them. It would have been probably more polite, by him. But after all she didn't mind that much, she knew that it was the way he was used to behave, in those circumstances, and that he did it in good faith. But on the other hand... During that sojourn, her brother had slowly changed, and fortunately for the better. He would have never talked about friendship in those positive terms, some month before. Now, instead, he was describing himself and the club as if they were one, to cheer up one of his friends. It had been harder than what expected in the beginning, but he was finally adjusting to that environment. Maybe it was because he had found a role, there.

Mion, in the meanwhile, had begun caressing delicately the doll. It was such an ease, holding it again in her hands... But suddenly she had realized something. She leaned it inside the case again, and she turned towards the twins: "Yes, I have never asked you for it... But when is your birthday, instead? I would like to... to repay you, somehow." Alice once had said to Chie-sensei that they had been born on February, Rena had heard them and she had revealed that detail to the others. _But we are already on February... So maybe..._ A bad suspicion came into her mind, and unluckily it turned out to be true.

"Thank you very much, but I fear it won't be possible." answered the Italian girl, in fact "It was... on the 7th of February. Four days ago."

_Like what I imagined, damn... _Mion lowered her face, regretful.

"N-no, you haven't to worry about it!" Alice exclaimed then "We have deliberately chosen not to say it, after all that was a hard period, your sister and you even had to be absent from school, and neither our mood was the most suitable one for a party, or for something else."

"I suppose that they have phoned you from Italy, to shout good wishes to you."

"Well, yes, but what does that have to do with it? Yes, they called us, Mom, Dad, my boyfriend Alberto... I miss him, to be honest. But pretending to celebrate it in spite of your feelings would have been cruel."

"Alice is right" continued Giancarlo "And moreover, I didn't bring the doll to the shop in order to get a reward, I'm not such an opportunist. It has been a pleasure, really, and you don't have to feel sorry for it. And moreover, after what had happened that day I knew exactly which present I could give you, at least. Choosing a good one is very difficult, sometimes, you always fear to make only a huge mistake, but in this case it was pretty easy."

"But that's not fair at all, I want to..."

They didn't listen to reason, insisting kindly that she hadn't to feel in debt with them. And since Mion was expected to be at the Manor for dinner, they took their car (which they have borrowed from Flavia, the following day they had to go out for work purposes, despite the fact it was a Sunday) and they drove her at home.

So, that late evening, she was still there, in her bedroom, happily smiling and holding the doll she had been returned. Shion had been already come back home, and she didn't know anything about that last present, yet, but she would have told her soon, so it wasn't a real problem. She was only focused on the doll, in that moment. It was beautiful. Like the day Keiichi gave it to her. _Yes, just like that day I'm so happy that they remembered of me... _She was living those same feelings, everything was like that day.

_Like that day... No, it can't be_. Mion scanned that doll, and a wrenching fear filled her heart and mind.

_God, please no..._

_..._

_This room is too hot... it's hot, it's hot, it's hot... Why is it so hot? My throat is getting dry, and it itches, as if flames from Hell are flaring inside it. The ache is even increasing, now. I hadn't to scratch my neck so much. But I couldn't help but doing that. There's something... something under the skin of my neck. What is it? What is moving under this membranes? I don't know, but its presence is unbearable... unbearable..._

_This room is too cold... it's cold, it's cold, it's cold... Why is it so cold? My own blood is flowing off from my arm, and the few heat I can generate goes away with it. The ache is even increasing, now. Who is the culprit of these wounds? Who had harmed me? There's someone... someone inside this narrow room, even if it looks empty. Who is he? I don't know, but his presence is unbearable... unbearable..._

_What is happening to me? Why had he led me here? To guard me? To watch over me? I... I hate this place, I'm feeling like a beast, here. I'm sat on the ground, no, I'm squat on my haunches, in one of the corners, but I am not a beast. I... presume not to be so. And I feel horribly, here. I... I don't want to stay here... please, somebody... help me..._

_I don't want to stay here, I don't want to stay here... You're making me cry, why are you making me cry? Leave me alone, whoever you are, leave me alone. Because of you I am crying now, in this dark room. Or at least tell me your name, your mere existence is driving me crazy._

_I'm... I'm not feeling fine... my heart is exploding, my mind is melting down... a nauseating_ _mixture of spit and vomit is coming out of my mouth, and there's no way I can stop it... my arms, my throat, every single member of my body aches as stung by a myriad of poisonous insects, as if they are endowed with their own will, and their own will is ordering them to part with the rest of my tormented body... Am I damned to live so for the rest of my live? What have I done to deserve this? No, please spare me. Please... someone..._

_What do you want, from me? Oh, yes... I was forgetting... if I do it, you'll let me live free, won't you? I will have a normal life, won't I? I will feel better finally, won't I? All right, I have nothing against it... This was what I wanted to do, initially. Yes, they're asking me to do only what I wanted to do, they're not shut me in, they're helping me... Because now I can hear my excitement roaring from the depth of my soul, because my aim, my only aim is her life. I can't defeat this pain, but I can inflict it to her. I can move it to her, and in this way I will feel better._

_Yes, because it's only her fault. Because everything, all the Evil I had to undergo during my worthless life... it is due to her, not to me. To her, and nobody else._

* * *

**Coming up: Well... you have read the last part. The paranoid is going to be back in action...**_  
_


	39. The Riverside of the Styx

**39 – The Riverside of the Styx **

_Hinamizawa, 19th February 1984_

"Thank God they have not gone in the middle of the wood, they have not taken their umbrellas, before going out..."

Rena's father was looking through the window, apprehensive. A light rain had just begun to fall, and that Sunday had become a day unfit for doing shopping, even though the early morning looked promising a sunny weather. Well, it was too late for them to go back, they had probably found a place where to stay for the moment, and maybe that was a transient rain.

Even if, to be honest, in the place where Rena, Daijiro, Rika and Hanyuu were, it wasn't raining at all, at least for the moment, despite the few distance between them and the Ryuugus' house. Freaks of Nature. In fact, they hadn't gone to do shopping, but they had placed themselves just behind the Furude Shrine, for a sort of joyful picnic. Midday had still to come, as well as their other friends, so they hadn't eaten anything yet.

Most of the others was still at the Manor, deep in being informed about the last news about the feud inside the Sonozaki family. There wasn't anything special to know, to tell the truth, but it was important to make Mion feel their proximity and support, as much as possible. After all, it was for that same reason that they had organized that picnic for. The previous days had been unusually hot and sunny, seen the period of year they were in, so they had decided to take advantage of this, and since weather forecast ensured another sunny day (wrongly, as Rena's father could certify), they had taken care of everything, in order to make her have a pleasant break from her pressing concerns. Of course it was a sober activity, calm and pacific, it would have clashed with her friend's actual situation, and let her relaxing was the main priority.

However it should be said that, outside of the Sonozaki clan and of the club, the rest of the village didn't look particularly troubled. Surely, the internal fights for the leadership inside the Sonozaki family had become the talk of the village, but nobody seemed really worried about what would have been about to happen, if Mion had been deposed. The poor figure cut two months before at the prefecture had still caused some legacy, and the fact she hadn't definitely been able to deal with Nabiha's betrayal had made a lot of villagers doubt about her real skills as leader. In the end, now it looked like a matter which merely involved that clan, and not the whole village. The normal inhabitants weren't sure which person was the best one as ruler, finally, and being on Mion's side meant likely antagonizing other friends of theirs, even if the deployments had not been completely defined yet.

Therefore, it was useless to ask Keiichi to stir them up, to make them join Mion's side, as he did to save Satoko in another world. The enemy was not a single villain like in that case, or a non-existant hatred by Hinamizawa's leadership against Satoko, he couldn't join the whole village together because both of the two parties which were going to face each other belonged to the village itself, and a vehement harangue could make that division even cleaner and then irreversible. On the other hand, also the Kimiyoshis limited themselves to sometimes ask about new developments, even if they had a further particular reason to behave so: Kiichiro, their chief, was still a bit frightened by Mion, he feared that she hadn't forgiven him yet, due to what had happened on the day of Oryou's death, and so he preferred to observe all from old woman never looked one who liked forgiving easily, and he wasn't fully sure that her granddaughter was different from her. Then, overwhelmed with guilt, he had never talked about the subject with her, which made him ignore that she had pardoned him for it a long time ago: unconsciously, he had created a situation similar to the one occurred a lot of time before between Oryou and Satoko, and it was pleasant for neither of the two of them.

_That's so stressing, poor Mii-chan_, thought Rena, _I have been luckier than her, her difficulties look to never end, unlike mines... _She thought to be safe, at least for the moment. While guessing so, she turned towards the others, and towards Daijiro in particular. He was a very interesting guy, from her point of view. During the period he had lived with them, he had always behaved seriously in every situation, he never joked with the others. He was so different from the others, he hardly ever laughed, when he was with them... he didn't like kidding, pretending to be an adult as if he was sixty, and not sixteen. Maybe it was due to the fact his father was not at home anymore, and that he wouldn't have come back soon, which had obliged him to take his place. It was a possibility, sure, but who knows, the truth might be also that he had been so formal since he was born. Finally, they didn't know a lot about his name in Okinomiya, it was simply senseless to make some research about him, and their efforts were aimed at something more urgent, at the moment. The only thing she could conclude for now was that normally a boy like him wouldn't have got acclimatized in the club, he was by far too grave. But that period was different, and such a friend was extremely precious, they needed all the help they could get.

In fact, once he had promised something, he always did everything he could to maintain it. His simple word was like a sacred oath for him, written contracts or agreements were like scrap paper, in his case. It was so ironical, from a certain point of view, he was his father's opposite, his real nemesis. Unlike his son, in the past that man had largely availed of those pieces of paper, to deceive his neighbor. So was Daijiro's behavior an attempt to distinguish himself from him? A way to express his resentment against him? Yes, she should ask about his point of view about his father's figure, Rena concluded.

She cared him. His attitude looked a bit unnatural for a young man, and most of people probably would say he didn't know how this world works, but she didn't dislike his character. He got easily awkward tons of times and for tons of reasons, but he was always coherent, and he was a very calm boy, which she liked. They were spending more and more time together, due to the boy's choice to guard over her, and consequently also their respective parents, Rena's father and Daijiro's mother, had started to meet each other frequently. Only as friends, of course, the woman was still married with her husband and she would have never considered to divorce, even if he was still under arrest. And so the new environment which was beginning to dawn in her house was pretty pleasant, in Rena's opinion. Rena and her father were not alone anymore, but everything was incredibly different from the time when he was engaged with Rina: the aura of uneasiness she could perceive in the previous summer was now absent, and she did consider their new guests and friends like good people. They were nearly like the missing parts of her past family, even though she couldn't look at that woman as her true mother's substitute, she rather looked like the classical housewife who was used to spend her whole life at home, too submissive and shy to resemble the woman who had given birth to Rena. Nor she could think about Daijiro as a brother of hers, in spite of the pleasantness she usually felt when she was with him. After all she had never had one, but she didn't mind. She imagined that both of the family needed the other one, in order to cheer up each of their members, and this was making her glad to have met them.

However, it was not time to think about that kind of melancholic dreams. Rena awoke from them, just in time to observe Satoko while she was finishing to check if everything was ready for the picnic. Holding a little notebook in a hand and a blue pen in the other, she was counting all the provisions: "And bread is here, next to fish balls, and my rice cake should be under this napkin... here it is, that's good." she nodded complacent "Well, I'd dare saying that we have everything, here."

"Satoko is right" replied Rika "We are going to eat and drink until we blow up... Nippa~!"

"Eat and drink..." commented Hanyuu, staring at the tablecloth they were sat next to, until she exclaimed "Hauuu! Rika, it's not true! There is food enough to satisfy the hunger of a battalion, but there is nothing to drink! Where is the fruit juice you have bought yesterday?"

"It's... Well, what can I say..." she tried to justify, feeling alike busted. The previous day, in a liquor store in Okinomiya, she had spent a considerable part of the budget for the picnic to buy an expensive bottle of wine, and when she had realized to have forgotten to take the fruit juice it was too late. She hoped that nobody noticed it, but since she had even left water at home, its absence became evident, even though Satoko had carefully checked only the food placed there, and not the drinks, theoretically their presence was something foregone. But Rika couldn't admit her fault, so, since she didn't know what to say, she lost quickly her patience, and she shouted, forgetting for a moment they weren't alone: "Hanyuu, don't make me questions I can't answer to! It will be somewhere, for sure, it can't have been vanished, it's not like you! Let's go home to take it, now!"

"And what if we don't find it?" Hanyuu had got a suspicion about the truth, but she couldn't be more explicit, frozen by Rika's face which was becoming frightening.

"We - will take some water, what could we do elsewhere? And by we, I mean you! Please stop being so negative, and give me a hand!" Hanyuu didn't dare to reply, she knew that Rika might be very vengeful, towards who slighted her.

"If you want, I can go and take it." proposed Rena "I don't want you to disturb."

"Are you sure?" asked Rika. Indeed, she was saving Hanyuu and her from a big nuisance. She just didn't want to stand up and help Hanyuu to carry all the necessary water, her ancestor was physically too weak to make it alone.

"Yes... Oh, if you are worried, Daijiro-kun can come with me, don't you agree?" The other boy nodded, so the blue-haired girl gave her the key of the entrance door, recommending her not to mislay it, and the two set off for Rika's house, which was just a few distant.

During the short walk they didn't speak. Daijiro was a person of few words, and Rena was too, when she wasn't spurred by Keiichi or Mion. So, after they entered the little house the girl knew very well, they easily discovered that there was no juice inside, as Hanyuu feared, then they looked for some bottled water, and the whole research went silently and quietly. Daijiro opened his mouth only when he found several empty plastic bottles, and he showed them to Rena. Nodding, she took some of them, and she went to the washbasin, to fill them. Tap water was perfectly drinkable in Hinamizawa, so they didn't worry about using it. After two or three minutes, once they had finished, they got a bottle crate from under the washbasin, and they filled it, to allow Daijiro to carry all that water more easily.

They exited the house, and the brown-haired girl locked the door again. Menacing clouds were now approaching over their heads, but rain didn't look so close to come. They weren't the reason of Rena's sudden agitation. She didn't know why, but her instinct was going on pushing her not to turn at the wood on the left of the building. _Why shouldn't I? What is there, behind those trees? _She was getting frightened, but she was curious too. And she decided to disobey to what that inner soft voice suggested, and to head for there, promptly followed by Daijiro who had delicately leaned the crate on the step by the entrance door, and who was asking her where she was going.

Rena didn't answer, and she reached soon the point she was told to say far from. Her bad presage was correct. On the overhanging roots of a tree, there was an object she knew very well, since she had used it score of times. It was her weapon, it was her nata.

Why was it there? It was her own nata, she could recognized its fatigued handle. But it was well hidden at the tip, and nobody could know where it was exactly. She had done so to avoid that somebody might be harmed because of it. But therefore someone had deliberately taken it, someone who had spied her often enough to know about that detail, or at least someone who had had a lot of time to look for something which belonged to her at the tip. And this person had put that object in that place supposedly to draw her attention. Who might he be? Her sixth sense suggested her to look at her right, and in this way the author of that gesture appeared inside her field of vision.

Here he was, no more than ten meters far from her. His dirty face, his greasy black hair. His beastly vivid eyes, his straggly and thorny beard. His dangling pace, his posture abnormally tipped forward. His ripped and spattered clothes, his completely ruined and consumed shoes. His extremely heavy breath, his own spit dripping from the border of his lips. And most of all his throat full of scrapes, clotted blood and other wounds. Altogether, that scary being looked a wild animal rather than a human, but finally that shadow was plain to be a boy, and Rena guessed to know his identity. Despite all those disfigurements, he bore a likeness to one of the photos she had seen on the cuttings she had been sent. He resembled Koji Seohara, and therefore he couldn't be anyone but his brother. The one who was stalking her, the one the police was searching for.

His glance looked dangerous, and then Daijiro immediately stepped between the two of them. But the other boy started to speak, suppressing with difficulty his wrath: "Finally we meet face to face, with nobody around us, Ryuugu _Reina_." It was like he couldn't see Daijiro, and his tone of voice was extremely unpleasant. But his breath got even heavier after those first words, and the ones which were about to come out from his mouth make her surprised even more: "I am tired, _Reina. _Tired of this story, tired of this endless skirmishes. That's why I am here. Let's settle this once and for all, and we will be both happier."

"What do you mean?" asked the girl.

"Don't listen to him." Daijiro cautioned her "I don't like this story, we'd better go away from here, and call..."

"The police? I don't agree with you, you moron, it would be a bad idea." answered Seohara, spitting to the ground, and trying afterwards to compose himself "I would immediately run away, in the depths of this wood there are plenty of hideaways I can take refuge in, as you know this forest is huge, and you won't have a second chance. You could bitterly regret this choice, a day."

Rena scanned at him. She wasn't able to realize what that boy had in mind... She could neither call him by name, she was noticing. She was used to call him only _Seohara's brother_... but he had his own name, hadn't he? Unlike him, she could avail only of her enemy's last name. And it was frustrating, it was a sort of psychological advantage he still had, compared to her, especially because he didn't stop labeling her as _Reina_, which she hated like poison. He was using that name carelessly, as if it was a thing he owned, as if he knew she detested it and he was using it to make her raging. And she couldn't bear with that situation of asymmetry.

However, there was a thing she had to understand: "Can you explain me how you were sure I would have come here? Rika-chan, or Satoko-chan, or Hanyuu-chan... All of them could take my place, and I've decided to go to this house of my own free will."

"It didn't matter... I couldn't ignore you were over there, I could hear your annoying voice, your irritating snigger... It would have been enough to neutralize them somehow, and you would have come here to check the situation. Of course without harming them, it is you that I want. Was I wrong? Would you ever leave your friends, alone, helpless, totally at my mercy?"

"You wouldn't have harmed them? The hell I trust you..." Capturing Satoko or Rika couldn't be so easy, especially next to that place full of traps, but maybe he had prepared a plan. That was why Rena was nervous, and why she replied: "And if nobody had come here? We are here because there we had nothing to drink, but what would have you done, if we had needed nothing? You couldn't go there and handle all of us, we were too many for you."

She was speaking so also to gain some precious time. She was sure that the whole club was about to come there, her long absence from the zone where they had prepared the picnic would have seemed strange, soon. Rika and the others knew where she had gone, they would have come and joined her to see what was happening. But the problem was that the other in front of her was calm, too, in spite of his grotesque look. Had he got anything ready even for them? And what? She couldn't see anything special, from there, but maybe the cause of their lateness had to be attributed to him... Rena was frightened because she was not able to see what was expecting them, and her enemy's grin was going on making her more and more nervous.

"Oh, well, in that case..." he answered, like trifling with them "I would have waited for this evening, simply. You are aware who actually lives here." his finger was pointed at Rika's house. "A quick call to your house, and you would have immediately come here, to try to save your little friend. After all, there's a reason if your weapon is here, if I've brought it here under your eyes... you need it, for our duel."

"Our duel?"

"Yes." he was wheezing now, longing for her like a beast who had located its prey. "If we have something in common, that's our will to end this matter as soon as possible. I know you are tired of my existence, exactly as well as I am tired of yours. If you share my same feelings, then, I propose you to settle this matter here and now. We will fight each other, and the winner will get out from under this unbearable burden."

"And what about the loser?"

"Can't you figure it?" he burst into a convulsive laugh, amused by that question which he found to be so silly "If I lose, I won't be able to survive to such a failure, there won't be any place for me to live... I will be a marked man. But if _you _lose... Well... I am going to quench my thirst with your warm blood..."

"Ryuugu-san, you don't have to accept this insanity!" protested Daijiro "This is pure madness! And you" he shouted, addressing Seohara "Can't you make out that you are already cursed, even if you win? Let's assume that, thanks to some fortunate circumstance, you are able to defeat her: what are you going to do, after that? Everyone will search for you, looking for revenge, or pushed by their desire to clap you in jail. Nobody will wait for you, nobody will give you a hand, neither at your home, neither between your relatives. You will be condemned to a miserable life, and to an even worse death."

"I am _already _condemned to that, to tell the truth." he hissed as only answer. "One more death won't change my destiny, from this point of view. But it can make my spirit free from this sense of anguish, at least."

"Because of what you have done to those other boys... and to your brother, too?"

"I don't want to talk about that, now!" he ragingly screamed, before adding "And now, _Reina_, reply immediately to my proposal. Are you accepting or refusing? You won't have another chance, I have already told you that, and if you play for time I will immediately run away, the others will be here too late to catch me."

That was absurd, Rena was aware of it. But that boy had appealed to her wish to live a calm life, far from that kind of stress, and as far as possible from every source of nuisance. She hated people who ruin the others' lives, she had hated Rina, in the past, she had hated Teppei, and now she was hating Seohara with all her heart. Without either noticing it, she had picked up the nata from the ground, and she began scanning him menacingly. Daijiro looked at her, and he blamed himself not to have his sword with him, in that moment. He would have fought instead of her, and he would have made that guy harmless in a flash.

Rena lowered her eyes, slightly trembling with anger. She had been convinced by the Devil's call. She sighed, trying to concentrate, and she placed herself in a three-quarter posture, gripping tight her nata, as to get ready for an attack, and declaring: "I only ask for two conditions, Seohara-san."

"Ryuugu-san, please, no..." begged Daijiro, but the girl didn't give heed to him.

"Two conditions... Which are?"

"First of all, I want to know which weapon you are going to use. It's not fair to keep on hiding it."

The other smiled, amused by that request, and he put a hand behind his back, taking a gun which he showed to his opponent. An ordinary gun, nothing special, but since it was a fire-arm he had a significant advantage. Rena's weapon couldn't split bullets into two halves, she was not that skilled, and the blade of the nata was not so sharp. What could she do...

"Ah, if you want to know" said Seohara, interrupting her thoughts "I will have only a shot, because there is only one single bullet here. Dodge it, and you are going to win. Let's call this a favor I'm doing to you, even if you don't deserve it. Our duel will be even, so. But you have asked for something else, so hurry up, I can't wait to see you goggling your own eyes, and collapsing to the ground, lifeless... What do you want, still?"

"I want that Daijiro is allowed to attend this... this farce. Just as precaution, I'd like to run as few dangers as possible. I wouldn't be surprised if you recurred to some genre of trickery."

"You feel alike sure to win, I see... But I don't mind." he had consented "Now, let this duel begin. Feel free to attack whenever you want."

Usually in that kind of challenges it was the one with the gun who could make the first move, but it was just the same, for her. A fire-arm is a long-range weapon, unlike hers, so the best strategy was to cancel her handicap, and running towards him, changing constantly direction not to be an easy target. She raised her nata, and she moved in to attack, with a feline spurt. She ran, fast like wind, resolute like a tiger, unpredictable like Death itself, while Seohara stayed just immobile, clumsily aiming with his gun. He immediately didn't look like a good sharpshooter, his hand was visibly trembling. Yes, winning that duel wasn't impossible, she guessed. She would have just harmed him, disarming him without touching any vital part.

There were only ten meters between the two of them, but the girl's run wasn't about to be short. Rena had to be careful, stepping once to the right, and then to the left for a second, and then to the right again. Zigzagging was fundamental, to reach him without giving him the chance to shoot. She would have made him hard-pushed, he would have missed her, and once he had wasted his only shot she would have won an easy victory over him.

Five meters far. A step forward, a step sideways, another step forward. From there, she could see his wild and ferocious eyes, but it was too late to get scary. And she wasn't afraid of it, finally. It seemed to her to remember another fight, happened a lot of time ago... But the opponent was not so evil, he wasn't evil at all. It was Keiichi. On the roof of the school, they had fight each other, and she was using her nata even in that occasion. Her nata, against his bat. But Keiichi wasn't angry at all that night, he looked so calm, and determined to... to help her.

That dismay lasted just a moment. That story had never occurred, it was only a sort of dream, and she knew it. She had to deal with Seohara, now. He wasn't like Keiichi, Seohara wasn't a human anymore, he was just a despicable being, undeserving of living. That's why she didn't know his real name, she guessed. She was happy not to know it, she didn't need to know it, names are reserved for people and friendly animals. Nobody would give one to a beast which is attacking him, or to an ugly thing, wasn't she right? She started to run even faster, stopping to zigzag, and strongly wishing to make that painful story end as soon as possible.

Three meters far. Seohara had likely got surprised by her unexpected change of strategy, he wasn't shooting, he wasn't either aiming at her, and he didn't look on the brink of doing it. Her nata, instead, was now high over Rena's head, ready to fall like an axe against her unlucky opponent. With everything she had got, she was keeping it in that position, and she was about to hit him, fast and definitive like an unavoidable sentence of Death. The toughest armor wouldn't have been enough to stop her fury, now.

Two meters far. Rena's eyes ceaselessly looked for Seohara's ones, to scare them, to make him understand who is the strongest there. They were scary, the veins inside them had appeared, giving to them a terrifying red shroud. The excitement she was living had given to them a monstrous look. Because the Demon inside her spirit was awakening, and it was going to show all its uncontrollable power against the unfortunate. Rena couldn't realize it, but she was grinning, now, and her murdering glance was locating the exact point to hit him at.

One meter far. The nata started to fall. Did she wish only to harm him, or was she trying to kill him? Rena wasn't sure to be able to answer, now, but she didn't mind, in that moment. She just desired her weapon to reach him, and that story wouldn't have tormented her any more.

Half a meter far. Rena looked at the blade which was approaching Seohara's white face. She was laughing, now, yes, she was laughing. She would have never missed him, and it wouldn't have mattered, if he had died after that duel. Who cared about him, in the end? He's nothing more than a bastard.

Some centimeter far. Yes, here we are...

_Pfffff..._

…

Rena woke up inside a little building, one she had never seen. _Where am I? And what has happened? _She exerted to remember. The last thing coming back was a little gray cloud coming from the ground.

_A gray cloud? _She exclaimed in a loud voice. Might it be soporific gas? Yes, it could be. Because she had been told that Satoko was experimenting it in the last period, and that she had realized some trap gas-based. Nothing really dangerous, in the end... But they existed, and Seohara was aware of them, he had just used it. That's why he had met her there, in that zone. There were many other ones better than that one, apparently... But that detail shifted their ground.

Now memories had entirely come back. She remembered that the guy's face looked so strangely pale... but there was a reason for it. In that moment, her state of extreme excitement didn't allow her to see the white handkerchief he had put on his nose. Probably it was wet, he had moistened him with some water before meeting her, to let him avoid to inhale that gas for an amount of time sufficient to run away from the cloud, and to wait for its dissolution, before taking her while she was out cold, and bringing her to that lonely place.

She vaguely remembered even something else... When she was still half-conscious, he had pronounced some words, and his tone of voice expressed all the resentment towards her. _He had told... __And now, welc..._ She hadn't heard the last part, she had already fainted by that moment. Well, _welc_ couldn't be anything but _welcome, _but welcome to that? After a short reasoning, she found out that the most probable ending was _Welcome to Hell_. And she didn't like that bleak prospect at all.

She stood up, anyways. The first thing she had to verify was where she was. It was a very little wooden building, slightly larger than a closet, with no windows, but with an austere sliding door which she immediately reached to open it and have a look out. Only trees, in front of her. She was in the middle of the forest, on one of the mountains around Hinamizawa. She could recognize the shape of one of them, and she was a bit relieved, discovering that she wasn't so far from home. But whose was that little house? Might Seohara, alone, have built it? It was impossible, the house was small, but solid and well-built, with nails and heavy beams all over her head. A considerable group of people were needed to make it, at least three or four strong and tough workers. So he had used a pre-existant house. There was no doubt it was Seohara who left her there, but that wasn't his hideaway, the lock of the door looked even cracked.

Yes, Rena couldn't be sure of it, but she was right. That was the little building where, some month before, Mion had spent the night, in order to complete the rite required to become the leader of the Sonozaki family. A humble house, with no windows and no comfort at all, where you could do nothing but reflect about yourself and about your future life. So, it was at the same time a perfect refuge for who wanted to hide, since it was nearly always empty. But Flavia and the Police had frisked it too in the past, so he hadn't lived there during all those days when he was wanted, rather it was maybe the first time he used it. After all, during all that time he had stayed alone, and he had been free to explore the area, which allowed him to find that little building, and after a quick survey he had concluded that it could become extremely useful, in a next future. Moreover, in the same way he had run into Satoko's traps, which filled the woods, and he had had to deal with them. While doing so, he could discover little by little how they generally worked, and how he could use the simplest of them at his own advantage.

Whatever. Since she knew the shapes of the mountains placed at the east of the valley Hinamizawa was in, Rena deduced from the Sun's position that it was morning. How much time had she slept? She had arrived at the Shrine when it was nearly midday, so a whole night had passed. As far as she was informed about the subject, the effect of that kind of gas doesn't last for a very long time, so she could exclude to have slept for more than a day. Namely, it was the 20th of February, and she was there, isolated from the rest of the world. The others had to be worried, for sure._ Another problem I've caused to the others. My poor friends, I'm so sorry. It's my fault... _

It was Monday, now, she was supposed to be at school. So, even if Daijiro hadn't informed the others yet, by that moment they would have understood that something was wrong, anyways. _No, why should Daijiro-kun tell nothing about this story?_ He surely had run to Rika, and to the others who were still waiting for her, and the police's researches had likely started after very few moments after her disappearance. And they were still looking for her, indubitably.

But what if Daijiro couldn't join the others, for any reason? He would have never allowed Seohara to bring her away, normally... Gasping, Rena suddenly remembered that Seohara had only a bullet inside his gun, if he was to be believed, but he hadn't used it against her. He had arranged something else to handle her attack, so he didn't need to shoot. But in this case, in order to eliminate every possible witness, and have some more time at his disposal... That was a scary possibility, but it could be tragically true, and the fact he had stayed with them because of a request by her made her even more mortified. Moreover, Daihiro was unarmed, and he wasn't able to defend himself, in those conditions. And she couldn't trust the other's promises, he had already betrayed her, just few hours before, and she could only hope for his sake, since there was no way to control if he was fine, for the moment...

She shook her head, to calm down herself. _I will get worried about it later._ She hadn't to be so pessimistic, for the time being, she was conscious Daijiro was not his primary target, and the noise produced by his gun might bring annoying complications, to him. Now she had to gather, from the information she could get in that little house, which was the best thing to do. Her weapon was not there, he had maybe thrown it away, cowardly. He had to be outside, waiting for her, as if that building was a mousetrap. It would be strange if he wasn't next to there, observing the house with a pair of binoculars, or sat on the branch of a tree. In that dispersed zone of the valley, he could wait as much time as he wished, without fearing to be disturbed. And the worst thing was that, by opening the door, she had already revealed him that she had awaken, and so he was ready to receive her. The fact there were no windows weighed in his favor, she had to make the door slide to check where she was, and so a possible surprise effect was unusable, now.

That wretched boy was like reciting, then, when he was at the Shrine. Despite his look, he pretended to wish to end the issue between them with a loyal fight, but he wasn't like a samurai, he hadn't at all that sense of honor called _bushido_ by Japaneses. But why drawing her there with that excuse? Wasn't it enough to drug her with that gas, avoiding to staging that useless dramatics? It would have been simpler... unless the gas worked only at a close range. He needed to push her to approach him, or at least to go to an exact point, where the gas could have an effect. She wasn't sure about that explanation, Satoko might eventually give a more reliable opinion about it, but that was the only one she could think about, and finally she could waste any time by imagining other possibilities.

Rena was blaming herself, now. If only she had listened Daijiro, she wouldn't be in such a danger. Maybe Seohara had contrived something also in case she had refused, and the result would have been the same, but that consideration didn't change what she had done. Her instinct had been too strong, and it had overshadowed her rationality. She was aware of it, now, she was aware that she had been feeling pleasure, while attacking Seohara. It was not only a way to defend the others and herself, but also a way to make the most aggressive side of her nature pour out. Because an aggressive side did exist inside her, she was sure of it. When she was under pressure, she could become very different from the usual Rena, the repressed part of her character sometimes came into light, and it was something she had always disliked. In the past she believed it was due to Oyashiro-sama's influence, but now? This couldn't be an excuse anymore. She thought to know herself very well, but maybe she was wrong.

Rena deeply sighed. It was not time to think about it, she had to be ready. Staying there would have been counterproductive, if he had got tired to wait he would have gone inside, and she would have been trapped. She had to go out... But in which direction? She didn't know the paths of that zone far from the village, but if they had built that house, there had to be one, at least. Moreover, Hinamizawa was in the inferior part of the valley, next to the little river, and previously, when she had had a look outside, she had noticed the slope of the ground, she was on the side of a mountain, at last. Therefore, going always down was probably the best strategy, she would have found a road or some inhabited house, sooner or later. And she had to run as fast as she could, he probably had some other fire-arms with him, like the gun he had shown before. The exit through the door was about to be the most dangerous moment, because he knew she had to go by there, and maybe he was already aiming at that point, like a fisherman who's waiting for the bait to do its job. That was why she had been brought there, in the end, she was easily controllable. But she had to risk, to save her own life. She sighed another time, hearing her heart beating frantically, and she swallowed. And then, with a sharp gesture and staying hidden behind the adjacent wall, she opened the sliding door.

* * *

**Author's note: Why the Styx in the title? Because in the myth this river is famous due to its swamp, exactly like the Onigafuchi. It's also a reference to the infernal anguish Seohara wants Rena to live, while she's trying to flee to safety (because this is Higurashi, and a happy ending is not supposed to happen necessarily...). You will read it soon (I hope)  
**


	40. Caron's Tale

******40 – **Caron's tale  


_Hinamizawa, 20th February 1984_

Rena didn't exit from the refuge immediately, after opening the door.. She cautiously stayed hidden behind the wall, to see what was about to occur. No shots. No sounds of gunfire. Wasn't he waiting for her move, then? She took her hat, leaned on the floor, and she stuck it out, to see if there was some reaction to the appearance of that bait. No, there was nothing. Then, taking all the possible precautions, she leaned out of the door, to observe the situation outside, and indeed she couldn't see him anywhere. _Yes, what a stupid, if he wanted to shoot me at once he'd have done it when I had opened the door for the first time._

The girl made one or two steps outside the refuge, analyzing carefully the surrounding environment. From there, she could glimpse at an old mule track, behind a group of trees, which looked to go down the mountain. Following it was the most reasonable choice, but also the most predictable one. Maybe Seohara was expecting her to go through that way, and a new trap was ready to receive her. But had she any alternatives?

No, the most important question was another one. Why had she been brought there, inside that little house? She could go out whenever she wanted, the door was not locked. And it was true that, until she was there, he could easily observe her, but on the other hand to do that he had to watch over the door. And he was nowhere to be seen, instead. He couldn't be far from there, it would have been senseless. Or had anything happened to him, after he had left her there? Had he arrested? No, it wasn't possible, in that case someone would have freed her, and she would already be at Hinamizawa, by that moment. Had he an accident, then? It was more reasonable, woods can always be dangerous, especially when you are absent-minded, focused only on something else, and you don't look where you walk. But it would have been a stroke of luck, she couldn't lower her guard because of improbable hopes, and moreover his body would have been next to the refuge even in that case. Maybe harmless, or faint, but still present. No, even that hypothesis had to be discarded.

So, where could he be? That anomaly was making her hesitant, forbidding her to run away as she had planned in the beginning. Next to her, she could see a motorbike, probably he had stolen it somewhere, and he had used it to bring her there, doing it would have been hard without a good means of transport. A real pity that he had sabotaged the gas tank, a black spot had polluted the grass below, and the bike itself was now unserviceable. But this meant also that quite surely he was on foot, too, so he had to be not far from her, at a place where he could keep a watch over the situation, and she did feel like spied by him. But he wasn't anywhere, in front of her, she couldn't see him. _But then... _Yes, Rena opened her eyes wide, having a flash of inspiration.

"The roof..." she whispered, turning instantly towards the house. And she let out a moan, realizing that she was right. Sat on the top of the building, he was there. His legs were next to the old gutter, keeping the soles of his shoes stuck inside it, to stay more comfortably and be sure not to slide because of the humidity present of the roof itself. His eyes, instead, were gazing at Rena, full of excitement. The pupils had nearly disappeared, becoming little dots present on his retinas, and shutting off continuously now the bottom up, now from right to left, now from a corner to the opposite one. And this was giving him even a more bloodcurdling look, even though the most immediate danger, now, was the shotgun he was holding in the right hand, vertically as if it was a holy rod.

Nevertheless, Rena showed to dominate the sense of panic she was feeling inside her. She raised her eyes, and she shouted, hoping that someone could hear her: "You were waiting for me, then, isn't it true, Seohara?"

The other limited to emit a titter. There was a reason, if he hadn't shot her yet. From that position, he could easily guard the house, but he couldn't observe directly the door, let alone aiming at his target. It wasn't a big nuisance, he could always hear the noise produced by the sliding of the door itself, or by Rena's steps, to understand when she had awakened and what she was doing. And, by seeing his face, Rena could conclude that probably he didn't want to kill her at once, he wouldn't have been funny at all, from his point of view. Yes, if she hadn't noticed him, he would have called her, to make her aware of her future destiny. Or rather he would have fired a warning shot against one of the surrounding trees, just to make things more interesting.

"I was getting tired, can you imagine?" he answered, finally "I had begun to fear that you had already died, down there... It would have been so disappointing, I had arranged such a marvelous showdown, and I was afraid that you had ruined everything like the other time. But now... you are here, at my mercy... and now..."

He was panting, now. His body looked like suffering from an incoming heart failure, and the wounds on his neck had opened again, letting his blood flowing again, but he was resisting to that malaise. The only purpose left to him was in front of him, and he wouldn't have desisted from that challenge.

"And Daijiro-kun?" asked Rena, concerned "What have you done to him?"

"He's... fine, yes, he's fine. He... won't disturb us, I can grant it."

Those words could stand for everything and its opposite. Was he really fine? Was he alive, even? Or, rather, during the period she was asleep... Seohara hadn't answered to her at all, in the end. But Rena couldn't think about her friend's destiny, at the moment. Unwilligly, she was forced to care about herself, now. In fact, the other added, swallowing back the blood going up from his throat "I... I am not an evil person, unlike you, and to prove it further I'd better to explain you the rules."

"The rules? Do you think this is a game?"

"Yes, it's become so, haven't you understood yet? I won our duel, so you have to obey."

"You have not won anything, you cheated!"

"NO, I WON!" he screamed, not accepting that remark. So had the starting duel a function? A way to show his superiority, to justify what he wished to do? It wasn't impossible to realize whether that was the truth or not "You are really a stupid girl... so I will tell things simply. I am the hunter, you are the prey." He raised his shotgun, and Rena immediately realized which his intentions were. And, from the position she was in, she couldn't take him by surprise, he was too high, on that roof. So she was just a toy in his hands, a hamster running here and there, but unable to run away from its little cage and forced to stay wherever his owner wants. He wanted to have fun with her, and inside that immense wood nobody would have ruined his amusement. But he didn't stop talking, so Rena decided to listen to him: "However, I'm leaving you a little chance to survive. Can you see it from there, can't you?"

"What are you talking about?"

"Oh, I was sure you could notice it... Well, I'm talking about this." he raised the other arm, holding Rena's nata. "I am going to always bring this with me, until we finish playing. If you are able enough, you might take it right from my hands, and fight me decently... But it would be quite risky, you can guess what will happen if you fail. We could call it... a stimulus to make you stay not too far from me, a further variable of our pleasant activity. Escaping and aiming at those four hovels down there would be a suicide, they are too far for your thin and puny legs, I'm afraid. So, you'd better to find a good strategy to defeat me, a trick to mislead me... but will you able to? I doubt that, but in the meanwhile... start to run..."

Without notice, he took aim, and he shoot the tree right to the girl's left, and fragments of cortex flew away all around her, risking to hurt her eye. And so, due to that fright her body turned back instinctively, and her legs began to move quickly, chased by Seohara's laugh.

Rena immediately lost sight of him. Without turning back, she was concentrating on running down quickly, sliding on the crumbly ground and jumping to avoid roots and other obstacles which could harm her. Seconds long like centuries passed, and the trees which she could see approaching her were no more than mere obstacles trying to block her flight. Their bare branches, long and bony like fingers of monstrous beings, didn't stop to jam into her clothes, forcing her to make, on and off, some violent jerk to free herself. At least, once she had got over them, they became a resource rather than a nuisance, because they prevent his chaser to see her, even if the usual summer thick foliage would have done it better. Moreover, her boots were greatly suitable for that task, so she could ceaselessly go on escaping, until a hidden stone made her stumble, forcing her to put a hand on the nearby tree not to fall from a little drop of the ground.

Breathing again, she thought about what was happening more calmly. Where was she, exactly, after that long run? She couldn't know, but she had to hide somewhere, so she looked at the drop next to her feet, which was three or four meters high. She bent her knees, and she jumped off the drop, landing on the ground below and resting her hands on the wet earth, to make sure not to hurt herself. Now the other couldn't see her at all, unless he had found a way to reach her.

But how could he do that, as a matter of fact? How could he follow her, within that labyrinth? He had left her escape, and he couldn't be able to trace her movements so easily. Maybe was there anything which forbade her to go too far from him? And what might it be? Another trap he had stolen to Satoko? Hard to say that. She hadn't met any trap at all, now, it was a zone her little friend had never explored before, since it was too distant from the village, and nobody was used to bring himself around there. On the other hand, he might be faster than her, even if she hadn't ever met him and she couldn't be sure of that, but... how could he shoot her, if there was theoretically no way to find her, in that wood?

At least this is what she presumed, but what if she was wrong? Mion and Shion once told her that the Yamainu used to keep an eye over Irie by placing a bug under the collar of his gown. Could Seohara have done the same? She ragingly took off her coat and her hat, opening each single fold and checking every single zone of the cloth which could come in useful for that purpose. She even tore out all the buttons of the coat, to be in no direct danger, but the only result was the splitting of a couple of her fingernails.

There was nothing suspicious, finally, and the girl's uneasiness was worsened by the icy wind which had got up in that moment. Feeling cold, Rena wore again her coat, now scraped and partially ripped, impossible to do up since there were not buttons anymore on it, but the cold air could mercilessly pass through the ruined cloth with no effort, and it numbed the poor girl's pale limbs. No sobs came from her mouth, nor tears had begun to fall. Nevertheless, inside herself she was in anguish. _Why am I alone, here? Rena wants... I want my friends... _ They were looking for her, certainly. But how much time would it have taken? Where were they searching? If they arrived too late, there would be no hope for her.

But it wasn't time to get so dejected. It was vital to realize what the other had prepared for her. Maybe he was availing of an accomplice whose role was watching continuously her position? They had never talked about that possibility, at the police station, but it couldn't be excluded. Not being alone gives sensible advantages even to this kind of delinquents. But who could be his helper? A mercenary was out of the question, a fugitive can't have money enough to afford one of them, and especially for such a long period of time. But, on the other hand, who could share his same feelings of hatred towards her? Another relative of those boys on whom she had poured out her wrath, in Ibaraki? It was nearly impossible, the police had checked all of them, and nothing strange had appeared.

Therefore, thinking up a better plan was not possible, at the moment. The only possible conclusion was to go on running down the mountain, staying hidden within the wood. She could be hardly noticed, in this way, and even in this case branches could interfere with the trajectories of the bullets. But which path could she choose, now? Rena looked down, at the bottom of the valley. When she started to run, she hadn't followed the mule track, the panic she had lived in that moment had made her go elsewhere, among the trees just behind her. So, from there she could still see the slope going down and down to the river, but there wasn't a road where she could place her feet safely, a huge extent of trees covered the whole panorama in front of her, and the ground was full of stones, roots and other sorts of obstacles. She wouldn't have been able to run fast as she wanted, but she had to try, staying hidden behind that little escarpment for too much time was dangerous: that was not a good point of observation, Seohara could arrive from the top of the mountain anytime and she wouldn't have neither noticed it. So, she looked around herself, and she finally found a corridor between two groups of trees which could be used as emergency path, and she restarted running at once.

It was not a good choice. After a few hundred of meters, the two wings of trees around her narrowed, making the passage harder and more dangerous. It was not unexpected, since it was not an artificial piece of work, but this didn't help her, anyways. She had to slow down further, and Rena began to get nervous. Her goal looked to move away from her, she was thinking about all the time necessary to reach again Hinamizawa, all the time when she was about to suffer, before arriving at the village, and seeing her friends aga-

"WHO'S THERE?" she shouted, suddenly. A crackling coming from her right had alarmed her, and she had immediately turned towards the source of the potential danger, but nobody was there. Might it be some little animal of the forest, perhaps a squirrel scampering on what had remained of the dead leaves of the previous autumn? Maybe Rena would have seen it, but it was the only plausible explanation. Hypothesizing that it was a suggestion due to her state of stress was something she wanted to avoid for the moment, paranoia was the last thing she needed, now.

However, she had stopped running. In front of her, the slope ground didn't go downwards anymore, but there was a climb nearly two-three hundred meters long, probably a little hill present on the mountainside. Going round it looked the worst choice, the wood around her seemed very thick in that zone and there was always the risk to lose her bearings, while the slant of the hill itself looked pretty easy to face. Of course, having to go up when you know you must go down was a bit irritating, but Rena said to herself to stay calm, and she stepped on the climb.

_Bang._

The strength of the inertia force made Rena fall to the grass, and after having recovered by the shock she immediately pressed her hand on the top of her right shoulder, before looking at her bloodstained palm. _How could he... _She turned behind him, and she saw a blurred figure in the distance. She couldn't distinguish his features from there, but it couldn't be anyone else.

Ignoring the loud laughs she could hear even from there, Rena went down at once, towards the bottom of the hill, and hiding behind a tree. It was clear that, from the other slope of the mountain, as far as she went up that little hill he could see her very easily, because as the crow flies there weren't obstacles between them, on the contrary of what happened before, when she ran downwards. As far as she was on that little rise, she was a target not hard to hit, so a detour was definitely necessary. After checking that the wound was nothing serious and provisionally bandaging it with her handkerchief, she turned right, going round the hill and fighting her way among the spiny shrubs.

She was wrong, then. The day before, when she had seen him for the first time after a long time, when he had challenged her, she thought he was a bad shooter, she didn't look able to hold a gun. But she had to change idea now, he had just hit her from a considerable distance. But how had he able to locate her? Maybe because of her previous scream? It was plausible. She concluded that she had to avoid to shout, therefore. She had to be noisy as little as possible, like a mouse who doesn't want to be heard by cats... Even though feeling like a prey was incredibly frustrating. It was plain that this was exactly what Seohara wanted her to live, but the girl had no choice, for now. She was unarmed, she had to follow his rules, for the moment. _But when I'm safe, I'll make you see..._

However, she had prefigured that an endless attempt of escape was waiting for her. For minutes and hours she did nothing but run, and run, and run, always aiming at the bottom of the valley, every time she could detect the direction of the slope, and every time the disposition of the trees and the conformation of the ground permitted her to. But Hinamizawa looked to never appear, or at least to approach. Her eyes could see only trees, and bushes, and plants. But where on earth was the end of the wood? She was already conscious that all the mountains around the village were covered by that green carpet, but getting lost inside was extremely frightening, especially because a lot of time had passed, the cold winter sun had already disappeared behind those same mountains, and less light was now filtering through the branches. There was no known repair for her, there, and she couldn't afford the luxury of spending the night outside. She had t-

_Fzzzz._

Rena turned her head again, leaning on a tree to guard her back. _Here he is!_

No. Around her, only brown cortex, and no human skin.

_So... it wasn't him._ Rena had imagined to hear a noise, and she had turned pale. No noises at all, only her panting breath. Fake alarm, again. But that anxiety was anguishing, it didn't allow her t-

_Is it him? _Another buzz, another shiver.

Rena was gasping, now. The lump she was feeling in her throat forbid her even to gulp. It was terrifying. Now she was seeing him on the trees, she was seeing him behind the bushes, and sat on the stones, and standing right on her path, and here, and there... She was seeing him everywhere he might be in, like her worst nightmare, and she couldn't avoid turning to the left and to the right, continuously, got into a petrifying panic she wasn't able to exit from. At least, if only she had her nata, with her... It would have been not enough to save her, but it would have been a source of relief, like a cute teddy bear to bring home. And instead it was there, held by Seohara's dirty hands, and she was harmless, escaping as never before.

_Seohara? Is he there? _No, he was neither there.

She looked above her head, to the sky, trying to find a Sun which was not there anymore. She wanted to cry, but she couldn't. Her sobs could draw the attention of her chaser, and she knew he wanted her to be that desperate. She had to be brave, she had to muster up courage, in spite of Seohara's presence, in spite of her friends' absence, in spite of everything. There was no more wind, now, and sunlight was getting weaker and weaker. A red sky was above her, foretelling a fatal future which was about to come, and soon coldness and darkness would have enshrouded the whole wood, and her life as well. There was no benign God helping her, there was no friends helping her.

_Where... Where is he? _She was asking herself. But she didn't refer to Seohara, this time. She was referring to someone who could help her, she was referring to...

The stream of her concerns suddenly stopped. She could hear a soft and continuous noise, different from the other she was used to listen among the trees. And, this time, it wasn't scary, on the contrary. _Water? Is this... the torrent?_ Heartened by that unexpected hope, she made a last spurt, and finally she was out.

She exactly knew where she was, now. She had been on that bridge plenty of times. It was a safe way to cross the gorge the little stream was in, and she was used to go through it, when she wanted to go from the pit to her house, or vice versa. Alone, but also with her friends, walking joyfully... even if Keiichi and Satoko always looked a few perplexed, when they crossed it. They were so funny, even because the others couldn't deduce why they were so, in those moments.

Now, at least, she knew the path to follow, and she stepped on the bridge.

"Here you are, finally..."

Rena was not surprised. The voice came from the other end of the structure, and she just raised her eyes at him.

Seohara was here, laughing, still holding Rena's nata in one hand and his shotgun in the other. Groping, fatigued, tired, but resolute to finish the job he had started.

"How have you been able to foresee I was about to arrive here?" she asked, calmly.

He didn't say a word.

"ANSWER ME!"

"I can... feel it... smell it..." He slowly said, his back bowed, his canines prominent, his bloody eyes staring at her prey "I can smell your odor. Your horrible, your nauseous, sickening odor."

Rena swallowed. He was not a human anymore, every inch of him was a wild beast, craving only for people's blood. So had he been guided there only by his instinct? No, it was much simpler. The boy had already understood that she didn't want to face him directly, despite the nata used as bait, preferring to reach the village. But in order to do that she had to go over that ravine, and crossing that bridge was about to be probably her first choice.

However, he looked to believe to what he had just said: "Your odor..." he repeated "Yes, I can perceive it, but not only... your fear, your terror, your anguish... I can see them, I can taste them, and they are so delicious... He he..."

He raised his shotgun, and now aiming at her legs. Unless she had been able to run away from the bridge, she was an easy target, she couldn't step on the right or on the left. But Rena knew also that escaping back to the forest wasn't a choice, he would have shot at once, and moreover she didn't want to enter the wood again, it would have only differed what the other was living as a final showdown.

"You won't run away anymore... the best is going to come..."

His beastly eyes were full of rage, and adrenalin completely filled his veins. But what was the final reason of it? Rena's instinct suggested her she had to know, even if she didn't understand why. But she had nothing to lose, finally. So, all of a sudden the girl whispered "Can I ask you something, before going on?"

"Hmm... And what is it? The last wish of the condemned person? Oh, and why not? Spit it out..."

"Why?"

"Why?"

"Yes, why. Why are you doing this? What has happened to you, to make you think I have been the ruin of you?"

That unexpected question made him surprised. But afterwards he began to smile, and then to sneer, and finally he burst into a satanic laugh.

"DO YOU REALLY WANT TO KNOW?" he screamed, so loud to be nearly about to make the dead awaken from their eternal rest. He went on laughing for several minutes, until he calmed down. He was ready to talk. He observed her, pitying her situation, and he said "You know... the problem is not only you."

He started to tell: "When you were in Ibaraki, you were quite famous, Reina-san. Your excesses, your feelings of persecution, your depression... Everyone in our school knew about you, and a lot of people gossiped about the raising relationship between your mother and that other man. Yes, maybe you were one of the few ones who ignored it, it always works so. They say that it was the cause of your behavior, of your bad attitude. But we didn't mind, no one didn't really mind about you. As far as you were not dangerous, as far as you were not a real menace, we had only to avoid you."

"But strange people come from strange relatives... I hadn't learnt this natural truth yet, in that period, but I was going to realize it soon. One day, while I was going back from school, I had run into your father, not far from our house. I was told about where you lived, your home was not in my quarter, so why was he there? I didn't understand, and my concern increased because I met him the following day, and the day after that, and then a lot of times in the following evenings. And he was smiling, every single time. He wasn't depressed by her wife's love affair, he neither looked to care."

"I was worried, but at the same time I was curious, and my brother was, too. It was well-known you were strange people. There were no dressmaker's shops around there, ours was a residential quarter, so he didn't aim at that zone because of his job. Might he turn out to be dangerous for our neighborhood, or even for our family? We had to make sure of this, so, one day, we concluded that the best choice was that one of us had to stay at home, in secret. We decided by chance that I had to be on it, so I feigned to go to school, the following morning, and I started to patrol the zone next to our house. Of course, usually a boy who plays hooky is easily noticeable, my uniform might show to the others where I was supposed to be, rather than on the road, but after all there are never so many pedestrians there after 8 or 9 AM, thanks to the absence of shops, so there were not many people who could get suspicious."

"Moreover, it didn't took a lot of time. Quite soon, I saw him. And he looked to be going to my house, with a bunch of flowers just bought somewhere. What did he want to do? I followed him, and my doubts were correct. He reached the entrance door, and he rang the bell."

"My mother is a housewife, so she was at home, and she opened the door, letting him go in. From their look, they seemed to know each other very well... A bizarre idea came up to my mind, but I didn't want to trust it. Even at the cost of being discovered, I decided to enter as well. And the scene appeared in front of my eyes was something which changed me for the rest of my life."

Seohara started to scrape furiously his throat, making some blood come out.

"They were kissing each other." he finally said, with all the hatred he had within his heart. "Your father was kissing my mother, and undressing her, and she was smiling, she didn't want to stop him, on the contrary... They were lovers, and nobody of us knew that. I immediately ran away, shocked by that sight, and I couldn't do without vomiting on the road."

He swallowed: "That truth explained me a lot of things... A lot of people, at school, were blaming your mother, because of her behavior, but your father was even worse, nobody knew about him, his fault was secret to everyone. I don't know when their affair had begun to take place. But I wouldn't be surprised if they had started it a long time before, Mom had been used to go to a sewing class, on the evenings, for so many years, and he had to be there, too, maybe as teacher, or counselor... Yes, I am sure of that. _Inside your family, your father had been the first who had a lover, and your mother wanted only to get even._"

Rena was a pillar of salt.

"When I told my brother what I had seen, he couldn't believe to me, and I couldn't blame him for this. But in the end he couldn't deny it anymore, and he trusted me. So, what could we do? Revealing everything to our father could turn to be a disaster, Dad had always been a jealous man, and we didn't want our parents to leave each other... We needed a way to make your father understand that it was better to stay far from her, but hurting him directly was dangerous, we couldn't harm him anyways, nor killing him. The real motive of our actions could always bob up, and we couldn't foresee how our father would have reacted. We had to hide it very well... _and the best choice was to hit your father by hitting his only daughter._"

"S-so" Rena stuttered "That day you wanted to... to take revenge?"

"It would have been funny, I have to admit it." he leered her "It would have been will and pleasure at the same time, and finding some accomplice was easy, as you can imagine. You know, one of them was also the brother of one of your few childhood friends..."

"Nagisa-chan..." Rena said softly. She had removed her from her mind, after she had come back to Hinamizawa, but that tale was spitefully reminding her that part of her life. That girl had even died after an accident, Rena was told, and she had neither attended her funeral. She began to reprimand herself for that rudeness.

But something had gone wrong" he continued "As you know very well... And after that day you turned out to be the disgusting person you really are, yes, exactly like what you are in reality, a cynical, violent woman. Like father, like daughter. If only you hadn't reacted in that way, everything would have run as programmed... You know, this night, while you were asleep, I could even finish the work I had started that far afternoon." He sneered "But now it was too late, it wouldn't have changed anything, and I feared to be somehow infected by your body, if I had touched you. Yes, the only relief left to me was that, after those days your father didn't meet my mother anymore, but this was not a sufficient consolation."

Rena didn't know what to think. Could she trust him? Why should he lie about that, to drive her to desperation? But he knew that it was something she could have controlled previously, before meeting him, and it sounded too complicated to be false. But, on the other hand, how could he be sure her father had not told her anything about it? It might be a story she already had been revealed years before, as far as he was supposed to know. _Maybe... Maybe he's so certain I ignored it because I'm actually living with him... From his point of view, if I still defend him it's because I don't know the whole story._ He was a raving mad, but he wasn't a stupid, and he had already demonstrated it, showing to be slier than her.

So, was that the truth? Rena remembered the first period in Hinamizawa, her father was so often very depressed. The girl had always supposed it was due to the divorce from his wife, to the fact he missed her. And maybe it wasn't a lie, maybe he did want to live with her again. But now Seohara was claiming he wasn't the man she thought him to be, pacific and devoted to his wife and to his family. On the same time, that sad and melancholic feeling was caused by his remorse and his regret. On the one hand, he had sensed that the rape attempt against her daughter by that woman's sons was also a warning indirectly addressed to him, and he was sorry to have caused her that kind of experience. On the other one, he was aware that his wife might have left him because of his past unfaithfulness: he had decided not to see her lover anymore, but it was too late, he had brought Rena's mother towards that temptation, and she had not been able to avoid that feeling of revenge, which made her finally fall in love with another man. At least, Rena was also aware that her presence had greatly helped him. The fact that his daughter was so strong, despite what he had made her live, had encouraged her, and slowly he had reacted to that trauma, little by little. But the brown-haired girl was not conscious to have had such a role, in all that story.

However, there was something else in his speech that had drawn her attention: "Why were you talking about _sufficient consolation_? What happened, next?"

"After that? Oh, it's easy to tell... Haven't you noticed anything, about me? There should be a detail you know pretty well..."

"I am not here to answer to your riddles!"

"Yes, you're right, you're here to die... So, don't you remember? I should have a severe visual disturbance, or something similar... I should wear glasses." He wasn't wrong. Those words made come back to her mind what Flavia had told her about him. Indeed, there weren't glasses on his face, despite his old disorders. Rena then scanned his forehead, and, under that patina of dirt and bloodstains, it seemed to her to see a sort of sign, like a little scar right above his left eye. She knew why it was there, it had been caused by her, the day when they had tried to lay a hand on her.

"You know, my brother and I had arranged that plan together, so he felt so guilty for what occurred to me, he was afraid my life was going to be completely ruined, and so he claimed to be the only responsible of that gesture, in place of me. If I think that he was neither there with us, he had to stay inside his classroom... But he couldn't prevent me from living a painful future. I didn't know why, but I started to go extremely often to the hospital, at least once a week, if not more. Nobody told me the reason initially, I guessed it was due to the ache I was going on having next to my eye... But I wanted to know, so I hid myself another time, behind the door of the study, and I heard the doctors talking to my parents... My health was worse than what expected... _They said that my brain had been damaged as well..._"

He flung Rena's nata to the ground, furiously. "Yes, they talked about schizophrenia." he stated, frustrated "I neither noticed when it happened, but sometimes I got violent, like a criminal, like a monster, and when I went back to normality I didn't remember anything. And it was due to this blow on my eyes, and to nothing else, the nervous system had suffered permanent damages, I couldn't have gone back to my usual self... And when I looked at my family I could see they were afraid of me, that they were pitying me, and I neither know what I was doing to them, I always forgot everything. I wouldn't know what to do... I had become a sort of modern Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and the potion which allowed this transformation was you. It was all your fault, _Reina-san._"

_My fault... _she thought. This might explain why so much time had passed between the arrival of the minatory letters and the first attack, and between the first attack and this one: in those periods of time he was less violent, and his anger was still controllable, on the contrary of what was occurring in that moment. But there was still a missing part of the story: "And so, you had forgotten about the murders, too? About the ones you had killed, about your own brother?"

He laughed, murmuring: "_Exactly... _I don't remember, I don't want to remember. I don't need those memories. Who's talking now, Jekyll or Hyde, the old myself or the new one? Can you guess who's speaking? No, since it has no importance, because now both of us want only to get rid of you, once and for all. This is our last desire. There is no place for me in this world, so I don't mind about what has happened, and what will happen next, but at least I will die with one less regret." He stopped sneering, and he raised his shotgun against her, one more time: "Speaking time is over. So, now that your last wish has been fulfilled, could you make me the favor to die? I am tired to see your face."

And without waiting for any further words, overflown with excitement, he pulled the trigger on.


	41. A war without winners

******4****1 – A war without winners**

_Hinamizawa, 20th February 1984_

The whole structure they were on was still trembling. The barrel of the shotgun was smoking, but the one who had just shot was not satisfied. The bullet had completed its flight inside the wood of one of the planks of the bridge, and Seohara was unable to get over missing her. How was it possible? He was sure to have aimed at one of her knees, and instead she was still standing in front of him, staring at him with a look of defiance. He was at a loss, and it was because he hadn't noticed that Rena, while he was shooting her, had grasped one of the ropes which worked as handrail, and that she had given to it a couple of very strong tugs, in order to make the whole bridge oscillate slightly, but sufficiently to make sure it was harder to hit her, which indeed didn't happen.

Now the other boy had to reload, and she was given a couple of seconds to run away from the bridge, and to go back safely to the mainland, where she could elaborate a better strategy. Unfortunately, the bridge itself was too long and Seohara was too far from her, otherwise she could have caught him out while he was taking new projectiles, and she would have taken at least her nata back, which was still on the ground, on the opposite side of the gorge.

How many bullets might he have with him? Could she wait for him to run out of ammo? No, temporizing wasn't possible, he likely had got ready for a long fight, and he had surely made provision for it. But where could he have all those bullets? She wasn't carrying any bag, or pouch. She hadn't been able to look where he had taken them just a few time before, she was busy running and reaching the dry land. _Maybe he has a large pocket somewhere, or else..._ Understanding that particular was essential, finding a way to deprive him of them could be an efficient strategy safe her own life. For the moment, she concluded she had to force him to shoot her at least another time, of course dodging the projectile again, and then she could see it.

By the way, he had followed her as expected, crossing in turn the bridge, which was now free. These were good news for Rena, which wanted to reach the other parapet. First, because it was a necessary step to go to Hinamizawa, just in case she was somehow allowed to escape again. Second, because her nata was there, and being able to grab it would have been a significant breakthrough. But to do that she had to run across the whole bridge, and during that time stretch he could easily shoot in her back. She'd better to run just after he had shot, maybe in this way she would have time enough to cover that distance. How much time did it take for him to reload? That shotgun didn't look a modern weapon, it was just like the ones they use for hunting, so thankfully it couldn't be ready before a handful of seconds.

But what if she was wrong? The bridge was a long structure, and she didn't want to run any useless risk, she wanted to have some more time to play around with. Might she disarm him, taking advantage of the moment he had to reload? Physically he looked by far stronger than her, but she could take him unawares, he probably didn't expect a frontal attack in that genre of situation. Stealing his weapon, and then throwing it away down the gorge, that looked the best choice: of course, by following that plan she could not avail of Seohara's weapon, after it had ended into her hands, even only to scare him: it would have always been unloaded, a mere piece of metal. But however she would have made sure neither him could use it, which was not bad. Moreover, she had noticed that he had to reload after each shot, so she wasn't probably forced to wait a lot of time.

Seohara was approaching her, now, aiming at her chest. She hadn't any more time to think about a strategy. Always staring at him, she slowly backed off to the wood, until she touched a tree with her back. And at the same time she was trying to make him come as next to her as possible, for her upcoming attack. Of course, in that way he could hit her more easily, but she was aware of that, and her own plan was asking her to behave so.

The other boy stopped when he was ten meters far from her, a distance with contented both of them. He looked at her, scraping nervously his throat with a hand, laughing like a devil torturing a damned soul, and with the other hand he clicked the safety bolt of his shotgun. Maybe he didn't understand what that girl was cooking up, but it would have ended soon. Just the time enough to move the trigger another time.

_Bang._

Missed. Rena, when she had seen he was pulling off the trigger, had jumped to the large branch above her head, and with an agile pirouette she had climbed up on it, making her enemy hit only the air. Now, she could observe him from a privileged position, and she could see him slobber for the anger, and then taking two new bullets from his left sleeve. Now, it was time for action.

By a prodigious feline leap, she jumped towards him, and she landed on his right arm, the one holding the shotgun. The howl of pain he immediately let out was chilling, he sounded a beast disemboweled by a butcher. Had she broken some bone of him? It didn't seem so, looking at how he stood up promptly, and at how he moved his aching arm. For him it had been painful, and nothing more.

Where was that weapon, now? Here it was, still on the ground, the blow had forced him to let it fall from his hand, and now it was there, at disposal of who was able to grab it first. The two rivals stared at each other, and they ran to it, in a dramatic challenge the one against the other. Who was able to take it would have probably won.

Seohara reached out his hand, Rena did the same. Who was about to be faster? They were so near to their object of desire. If the boy had taken the shotgun, there was no chance he could miss again, Rena wouldn't have been able to escape far enough. But if Rena had grabbed it, he would have been nearly harmless, in front of her, his whole plan would have been dashed, his hopes would have fizzled out. His hand was there, by the weapon...

Thankfully, Rena was faster. She grabbed the shotgun, elbowing him, and she immediately stood up to throw it away, bending her body backwards to hurl it farther.

"No, it won't end so!" Seohara had a leap of pride, and before she could do it he pounced on her, to block her in any way. He reached her just in time to avoid she could fling it as she wished: she had been able to throw it, but the trajectory of the weapon got higher and shorter, and, even because of the distance between the wood and the bridge, it didn't reach the gorge, landing on the ground with a metallic sound.

Rena, in the meanwhile, had fallen to the ground in turn, crushed by his fire. The previously wounded shoulder was now aching, because of that last blow, but she quickly gained back her self-control, and she realized her enemy was not attacking her. Then, having an instant to do that, she examined the situation. Seohara had already stood up, and he was running quickly towards his shotgun, ignoring her for the moment. It was too late to second-guess him, and she had not time enough to take to the forest again, so she had only a choice: "My nata..." She stood up, and she started running to the bridge, resolute to cross it.

Soon she reached the bridge, and she went on towards the opposite end. Her heart was going crazy. She could clearly hear the noise producted by the shotgun while being reloaded, behind her. Seohara had chosen a strange place to hide the projectiles, but as far as he had placed them there she couldn't steal them, as she had hypothesized before. He might have a kind of belt under there, which he had filled completely with bullets and which he used to stock up, or rather he was using another devilment created God knows how. Anyways. She would have taken her own weapon, it was clearly the best choice, now. But after that? What was she going to do? That anguishing doubt was distressing her, but she had to take it one step at a time, she couldn't afford the least mistake.

Her steps were getting heavier and heavier, and even if she wasn't turning back she could sense the barrel of the shotgun moving in her direction. And the run of her chaser as well, who was reaching in turn the beginning of the bridge to shoot her without being disturbed by the ropes which were sustaining it. She couldn't stop for any reason, she couldn't take the liberty of resting and breathing again. Her life would have been the price to pay for that fault, so she had to continue. Even if her shoulder was still bleeding, even if her feet were aching because of all those never-ending efforts.

She heard the click of the safety bolt. He was ready to shoot once more. But she had already got past the half of the bridge, and once she had reached the end, she would have been able to take her loved weapon, and she could have defended herself. She couldn't give up right now...

She arrived at the end, breathless. She crouched, and she began to spy out the land, to find it.

_Where is it? I was sure to have seen him making it fly round here..._

_Here it is! Hurry up, Rena, hurry up!_

He shot, and this time the bullet was aiming at her head, with no chance of mistake. Joking time was over.

The projectile flew, and it flew. Fast, implacable, straight ahead towards its target, it wouldn't have missed it.

And an instant later, a loud metallic sound was heard for quite a few part of the valley.

The bullet had been deflected. Rena had used her nata as if it was a katana, and she had hit the ball, making it end into the ground.

The girl sighed by the relief, she had a narrow escape. The only pity was that a nata is not so sharp as a real sword, she would have split the bullet otherwise, which would have intimidated her enemy. Now, instead, she could see the sign the projectile had left on the blade of her beloved weapon. She would have never been able to get it out from it, but whatever, that was the least of her problems.

Rather, she had to approach him again. He had already reloaded his weapon, and finally her hatchet was a short-range weapon. She had to go through the bridge again, like in a sort of chess match, where strategy was more important than mere action. But how to cross it, without being shot?

No, she was looking at the problem from a wrong point of view. One of them had to reach the other, but why had she to be the one doing it? Seohara was visibly losing his temper, he was going on mauling his own flesh with the nails of his left hand. His throat, his wrists, and most of his body was covered by blood. And maybe he was also putting the blame on her, for this, as if she had been the one who harmed him. He was consumed by his purpose, so he could be easily provoked.

"Seohara-san" she shouted "If you still think this is an honorable duel, why don't you come here and fight face to face against me, instead of being there like a coward?"

The little stratagem worked perfectly. The boy roared as if his pride had been humiliated, and he immediately ran to attack her enemy, like a bull who had just seen a red curtain. Rena had reached her aim, risking nothing.

But she was a bit disappointed, when she realized that unluckily the bridge itself was supported by too many large ropes. Safety reasons had required them, but if only they were older, or thinner... She would have cut them, and he would have fallen down with the whole, with no chance to survive. Or at least, even if he had clutched at one of the boards or at one of the ropes and he had gone up again, he would have stayed on the opposite side of the gorge, unable to reach her, and she would have escaped very easily, within the wood, or through the path which went away from the ravine.

But Rena knew she would have anyways hesitated. By taking that choice there was quite a high chance to kill him, and she didn't want that. She still regretted what she had thought when she had attacked him for the first time, the day before, and she wanted to be different from him. She didn't want to be a monster, like how Seohara looked like.

She went away from the bridge, then, waiting for his arrival. She could observe him while he was zigzagging along the bridge, like drunk of wrath. His dangling body was still aiming at her, and his completely hunchbacked posture gave him the look of a formless creature, of a slime dragging on the ground and trying to phagocytize its victim. He was walking as if he couldn't see her... and he was here for her, indeed. His same desire was so strong not to let him see what was happening around him, including the object of his desire itself. He was trembling, looking feeling cold. He was feeling bad. He wasn't going to survive to the end of that day, whatever was about to be the result of that battle.

It was necessary for him to be less than ten meters far from her, to make him realize where she really was. Instinctively, he aimed and he shot, but the bullet hit only the grass, going quite far from Rena. The girl had noticed that the direction of the barrel was not directed towards her, so she wasn't scared, at the moment. Unfortunately, this time he already had a couple of bullets in his left hand, so he immediately reloaded, not giving her any time to attack him and disarm him.

He hardly was up to breath. His mouth was wide open, his throat had to ache terribly, still bleeding in a pitiful state. _What's the sense to get so bad? Why is he putting up with all that pain? _Rena wanted him to surrender, both of them would have been happier... But was he about to accept? She wasn't like Keiichi, she wasn't able to convince people. Moreover, it was plain that he had contracted the Syndrome, he wasn't anymore a boy listening to reason. He wouldn't have given heed to anyone, and especially to her. But she had to make however a try. She placed in front of him, and she started to speak: "For how much time do you still intend to fight, Seohara?"

The other, trembling, raised slightly his head, and he gave an absent-minded look at her, as if he had understood she was talking to him, but he was not able to comprehend her words.

"Please tell me" the girl went on "How many bullets have you at your disposal? You can't put infinite ammo, inside a sleeve. What do you think it will happen, when your shotgun becomes unserviceable?"

"I don't know" he replied, fatigued "And honestly I don't care. One projectile is enough to make everything end, finally, don't you agree?"

"Not at all. You have used a lot of them, until now, and _nothing _has come to an end."

"Let's see if after this new attempt you will still have the bravery to say so, then." His weapon was ready to shoot, again. But it would have been his last chance, Rena was sure of that. It would have been enough for her to make him miss, and with her nata she would have hit the shotgun itself, damaging it or throwing it definitely away from its owner. There weren't traps there, she wouldn't have been deceived another time, and she already knew what to do. She prayed Oyashiro that everything might run fine, and that her aching shoulder didn't torment her in that crucial moment. And then, she raised her nata, keeping her feet well planted in front of her opponent.

They were not far the one from the other, no more than five meters. He had completely missed her before, but now he had calmed down, and he was focusing on not making any more mistake.

He was ready. She was ready.

A devilish smile appeared on Seohara's face, and he moved the finger next to the trigger.

_Bang._

A scream filled the air.

And Seohara knelt, shouting and rubbing convulsively his eyes.

What had happened? While speaking, with her half boots she had dug little by little a small hole into the soft sandy ground, and she had inserted her own foot inside it. When she had seen him on the point of shooting, she had kicked with that leg, and all the sand had ended on Seohara's eyes, blinding him for a moment, and making him shoot nowhere near her.

That was the chance she was awaiting. His enemy harmless, his shotgun lying on the ground, not far from him. She ran as fast as she could, covering the short distance between them, and she quickly grabbed it, to get immediately rid of it, finally. Yes, she was walking on air, it was the end of a nightm-

_Bang._

Rena collapsed to the ground, overwhelmed by pain. Her right hand, the one which was trying to take the shotgun, had become a disgrace of blood and flesh, horrible to see. How was it possible? The shotgun was just under her hand, and there were no bullets inside it, she was sure of it. So...

"Did you think that you could touch it with your dirty hands again? That I was so stupid, my poor _Reina_?"

The brown-haired girl turned at who was mocking her, and she saw a wisp of grey smoke, coming from a small gun into Seohara's hands. The smoke of hoax. So had he got ready to that? Was he expecting that move by her? Probably it was so.

"This day" he murmured "is the most important one of my life. Even more important than the one when we met for the very first time. Did you really pretend I hadn't given attention to every little, every microscopical detail? I had arranged a good plan, that day, nobody could see us there, we wouldn't have been suspected of anything, and only your beastly reaction had wrecked it. Today you will attend my revenge. I am sharper than you, I am better than you, and there's nothing you can't do!"

And before she could even try to stand up again, Seohara shot her in a leg.

Rena bit her lower lip, and she closed her fist due to the pain. Only the left one, because the right one was still bleeding, and it hurt like hell. The ache forced her to close her eyes, so she couldn't see him while throwing away her nata, and she was even barely able to hear the wanderings which the other was saying: "There have been so many nights, when I had been thinking I had not to come to this world, Reina. Nobody needed me, on the contrary. I had been the cause of so many troubles, and of so much pain, I recognize this. I've accepted this sad truth, and I am ready to help this world to remove myself from its face. But what I can't accept is the fact you are even worse than me, and that, unlike me, you were destined to a happy life, without my intervention. Why could you? You have made lots of people crying, exactly like me. Why my end had to be different from yours?"

In the meanwhile he had thrown away his gun, down the gorge, and he had taken back his shotgun, slowly reloading it. Rena was at his mercy, unable to defend herself anymore, and he could take it easy.

"Originally I had planned to kill you with this, and that's what I am going to do. It's always better, when things run like you have wished. During all these weeks, I had arranged everything so that, today, I could be in front of view, and with this weapon. You know, this belonged to my father, he had never used it, but he liked to have a weapon to use in case of emergency. At everyone's disposal, we could say that every member of the family was allowed to embrace it. And so I had borrowed it before leaving to this flea-bitten village named Hinamizawa. How could you like that group of smelly houses, and order to your father to come back there?"

"You wanted to kill me only with that? But that day at the Prefecture you hadn't used it, or may I be wrong?" she dared to reply.

"SHUT UP!" he shouted, hitting her on the head with the stock of the shotgun, and making her forehead bleeding. Rena instantly blamed herself for what she had just said: she already knew that using logic didn't usually work with who had been struck by the Syndrome, and provoking him was the last thing to do.

"Do you think I could really walk around with this into my hands, among all those people? You are only a poor idiot." and to point out that declaration he shot her in one of the knees, as if his dogma was strengthened by that action. And then, heedless of Rena's heartbreaking scream of pain, he reloaded again, chuckling, and he went on being delirious:

"Can you imagine it? I had never seen this shotgun, in my house, before taking it. I suppose that he was afraid that I could find it, and that my schizophrenia could make me do something terrible... How could I think he was wrong? He was rightly worried, after all I was not normal... I am not normal... And that's because of YOU!"

Another fire, this time bound for one of Rena's feet. The girl lied on the ground, prone, stricken by an atrocious pain coming from all her body, and captured by the deepest desperation. Foreseeing what was expecting her, she was wishing to die as soon as possible, before he could finish torturing her. Seohara instead, as far as he was concerned, didn't show any sign of human piety. Standing by her face, he was nothing more than a beast which was tearing to pieces the prey it so strongly desired, before finally eating it. In fact, he looked at her, and he commented:

"You see, earlier I was aiming at your head, I didn't want to torment you so much... But you wanted to make things complicated, you also grabbed this twice, so_ I had __to do this, _and in this way. Blame yourself, if you're suffering, now. But let's see... your legs, your arms, your head... your whole body has been destroyed, all your limbs have been desecrated, Reina. It's so... satisfying, so exciting, I would really like to caress you now, while you are so painfully dying... Oh, no, I was wrong, I had forgotten a part of you, your bust... First, its lower part-"

Fire, and Rena's back started to lose blood. Rena didn't scream this time. But she was crying because of that ache, looking only the ground next to her face, and avoiding her torturer's sight. That was the only grain of dignity left to her.

"And now, the upper one... But I have to dodge your heart, and the other vital parts of your cute body too, as I've told you I've decided that we must play for some more time... Where should I aim at..." he looked for another bullet inside his sleeve, but he got disappointed: "Oh, only one projectile left... A real shame... I shouldn't have freed myself of that other gun, it would have been so useful... Oh, well, this is the end of our road together..." With the tip of the shotgun, he luxuriously touched the zone where Rena's heart was, as if that barrel was his warm finger delicately moving on her trembling back, and then he finally whispered: "_Sayonara,_ you little witch..."

His ears were filled by the sound of the fire, and he burst into a dramatically liberating laugh.

It was over.

…

Or not?

Why the girl at his feet was still trembling?

Why... Why was she still alive?

And... And whose was the hand which had grabbed his, forbidding him to shoot?

He hadn't either noticed it, before. He was so sure to have pulled off the trigger that his brain had heard a non-existent noise, the noise of a bullet while exiting from the barrel. He had been foretasting the complacency to have done what he had set for himself in advance, but due to a sort of autosuggestion he pretended to have shot, even if he hadn't.

That last bullet was still inside the barrel, instead, and it wouldn't have been easy to shoot. Awakening finally from that sweet dream, he turned his head with a big effort, as if it was blocked, and he looked at the spoilsport.

"Who... Who dares..." It took some second to recognize him, until Seohara said: "_You... _you are still here, you are still pestering the life out of me!"

"Shouldn't I?" the other replied, and Rena immediately found out who was it. She slowly turned at him, aching all over, and her face brightened up with a final smile of relief and happiness, when she saw him: "D-D-Daijiro-kun..."

Daijiro was stronger than Seohara. Despite his tiredness, after running breathlessly to reach them, he was a healthy boy, more trained and powerful than his opponent, and, even if he usually did his best when he held a sword, he could fight pretty well with no weapons at all. Indeed, with a well delivered kick, he made him fly away, making him fall to the ground. No way he could lose against him, but Seohara had still his shotgun, he had held it tight into her hands, and he had already said there was a bullet inside it: "Can you imagine what may I do, with this? A shot is enough to kill you, and your little friend behind you is weak enough to be sent in front of God even if I am bare-handed."

"Why don't you try, if you're so sure?" Daijiro answered "But you should ask yourself another question, now... In your opinion, am I alone?"

Seohara gasped, and the other continued: "I ran faster than the others, but it won't take much time for them to join us. And then..."

The raving mad screamed like a devil stabbed to death. But he hadn't surrendered yet. He had still a bullet, and he aimed at that pest.

"D-Daijiro-kun, run..." said Rena, with all the strength left in her body. That scene reminded her the one between Takano and Mion, there were so many similarities. An already defeated enemy who wants to ruin the win of the other party, with a gun and its last projectile. The girl still remembered what had happened last year, the desperation inside Takano's eyes and the one inside Seohara's ones were just the same... They had been feeling like trapped animals, with no chance of escape. She knew what people with no more hope could do, and she absolutely didn't want to live that kind of experience again. That's why she was as worried as the other time. Or better, she was even more concerned, that day the situation was getting more dangerous, the two boys were too near, and he would have never missed him...

"D-Daijiro, please..." she repeated. But the other didn't move away as she had asked him. On the contrary, he started to walk towards Seohara. He was approaching him, and endlessly begging him not to shoot.

"Be still! Don't make another step, or..." the other shouted, scared by him. But Daijiro didn't obey, and the stress inside his mind increased so much that he surrendered to the fear, and he shot to push him away.

_Bang. _A last time.

Seohara had closed his eyes, terrified, before firing that last projectile. He opened them again only afterwards, got suspicious by the kick of the shotgun, stronger than usual, and by the extreme heat wave his hands had perceived. But, when he did it, he saw what he didn't want to see.

His weapon had exploded. His left one, the one usually leaned on the barrel to well aim at the target, was now covered by severe burns, and neither the other one looked in good condition.

"W-What..." he tried to exclaim "Why am I not feeling any pain, even after looking at this..."

"I can't answer about that" replied Daijiro "But that was why I was asking you not to shoot."When I grabbed the shotgun not to let you kill Ryuugu-san the barrel moved from its support, and a lot of powder has come off from it. The first thing I had thought was that it was gunpowder, but I don't know why it exited, and from what. Maybe the last projectile was defective, but I can't be sure, I'm not an expert."

"So, when the trigger has been pulled off, the gunpowder outside the shotgun has caught fire, is this what are you claiming?" he started trembling of rage, before shouting: "THAT'S ALL YOUR FAULT! YOU DID IT ON PURPOSE!"

"Explain me how could I, then. I could fix you in many other ways, more honorable than this one. However, if you still want to fight, I am at your disposal, but I don't think you can do much in those conditions. You'd better wait for the others, and we'll find a way to help you too, even if you don't deserve it" After saying this, Daijiro decided to turn back, ignoring Seohara who was leaning and sobbing harmless on the ground, and talking to Rena. She had lost a lot of blood, she had visibly weakened, and the boy, while trying to give her first aid, was worried that she might bleed to death.

"Hang on, Ryuugu-san. When the others arrive, we'll bring you to the next hospital. Kasai-san and his car should be not far from here, you will be very soon at the clinic, cured by Irie-sensei." Rena was not sure, but to her it nearly looked that he was crying, which was very unusual for a person who rarely showed his feelings.

"D-Don't worry, Rena will fight" she answered "But... how have you been able to find us?"

"It has been enough to hear the first shots. Fortunately we are inside a noiseless valley, you can notice them even from a long distance, and so we immediately flew here."

Rena smiled. If she hadn't escaped from that little refuge, if she hadn't run desperately until reaching the bridge, they wouldn't have heard anything, they would have been too far from her. All her efforts hadn't been useless, therefore. It was consoling. She closed then her eyes, but Daijiro suggested her not to fall asleep, she had to stay awake as much as she could. And finally she had to comfort the others too, she could hear their troubled steps and she had to show them she was not feeling so bad.

Keiichi and the others arrived after a few moments, and they immediately looked for Kasai's car, to drive her to the nearest hospital, which was Irie's Clinic, as a matter of fact. All of them nearly ignored Seohara, guided by a mixture of defiance towards him and apprehension towards their wounded friend. They didn't see him while standing up again, and starting to whisper: "So, here we are..."

"What are you blabbing about, now?" asked Rika, annoyed. Wasn't he tired to fight uselessly? Hadn't he accepted his defeat, yet? What might he think to be able to do, against all those enemies? He could neither run away, now, Flavia had been called too, and Satoko and Satoshi were keeping an eye on him.

"I... I would have been content with a stroke of luck. With a single day spent as I wished, nothing more."

"What the..." Rika exclaimed. Those insane words were making her get seriously angry, and she approached him to give him a slap. But she changed her mind, frozen by dread, when she realized what he was doing.

With his right hand, the only one he could use, he was clawing at his throat.

"Every day I lived on this earth... has been a path of pain and sorrow..." he stated, between a moan and another. "Why have I been here? Just to suffer, like a beast? I didn't want to... It would have been more bearable, if the others shared my own regrets, but the others looked so happy, with no exceptions... It would have been enough to see a single person suffering like me... I would have faced my life, at least... But so... I can't deal with..."

His nails were carving more and more deeply inside the flesh of his neck.

"Mates, block him at once!" shouted Rika "He's killing himself!"

It was too late. Before anyone could do something, the words spelt by his voice began to be indistinguishable. Copious blood flew from his throat like the stream of a source coming off the mountain, and the pupils of his eyes faded soon, until reaching a lifeless white color. Tears were mixing with blood, and the sight of him convinced Shion to reach Satoko, and she covered her eyes with her hand, not to make her see the death of that boy. It was a horrible scene, which however ended soon, to everyone's benefit. After a final cry, his body collapsed to the ground, and he splayed his bloodstained arms, before leaning the head on the soft grass and passing away.

The others couldn't do anything but looking at him. Then, Rika approached his corpse, and she attentively closed his eyes with her fingers, wishing melancholically: "May your soul find the peace you were looking for here, Seohara-san." Then she addressed the others: "Rena, and you others... I know he has done a lot of crimes and horrible sins, but please don't be so harsh with him. Now you have seen what the Syndrome can do to people, haven't you? Something which transcends this boy's own will, something too much often stronger than human spirit. This is not the result of human hatred – at least, this is not _only_ the result of it – but of the monstrosity inspired by that damned parasite. The last period of his life has been so miserable, please don't keep going at him. His family would suffer further, and we wouldn't have any advantage for it."

"I see what you mean." answered Shion "If Mom was her, she'd agree with you. She always says that, after that your enemy is not opposing you anymore, you must behave respectfully towards him, going to his grave, or visiting him, and so on. Once we had met Oishi-san next to the grave of a person he valued very much and he..."

"I think we shouldn't waste any further time." replied Kasai, who had arrived with his car. "We have to assist Ryuugu-san." We will lay her down on the rear seats, and one of you will stay next to her, to check her state of health. Do you agree?"

"Hmmm... Yes. I'm sorry, I shouldn't talk so much in moments like this. You're absolutely right, Kasai." answered Shion, embarrassed.

Then Keiichi approached Rena, which had been lying prone on the ground all the time, without ever attempting to move from there: "The only thing I really regret is the fact he will never answer to any of our doubts. This whole story was getting more and more disturbing... And there are so many questions needing an answer... Whatever, I won't give up for sure, we still must give a hand to Mion for her battle, and Rena will join us. Won't you, Rena?"

Both Rena and Mion nodded, smiling, to cheer each other up, and so Keiichi asked Rena if she was up to try to stand somehow up, and enter the car. The girl shook her head, and Keiichi exclaimed: "Don't worry, that's just the same! I will take you on my back: you have been hurt, of course, but you shouldn't have any bad fracture, normal bullets are not cause of them, so I can turn and pick you up without hurting you more than what is necessary... However, could you help me turning you on your back, at least? It's difficult to lift you while you are prone, I wouldn't like to..." he blushed "To touch unknowingly your... Well, I suppose we have got along."

The others laughed, amused by those words. It could even sound a bit disrespectful towards the dead boy, but the truth was that they had been terribly worried for their friend, and now they needed to relieve tension. But that serene atmosphere vanished when they realized Rena didn't smile.

"What's the matter, Rena-san?" asked Satoko.

"I... I can't move." she whispered. "I can't turn."

Rika and Mion immediately came next to her, and they asked her how she was feeling.

"I can't move." she said "My hands ache, my shoulder is wounded, and..."

"And..."

"And..." she cried "I can't feel my legs anymore..."

* * *

**Author's note:** **Well, the last line explains the title... **

**Please review if you like the chapter, and stay tuned :)  
**


	42. Die in pain, rest in peace

******42**** – Die in pain, rest in peace**

_Hinamizawa, 21st February 1984_

"Sensei, sensei, how is she, then?"

It was still quite early in the morning, and a new day had begun, but nobody was there, inside the old building used in the past by the forester and in the present as school, nobody felt alike studying, or teaching, in Hinamizawa. Everyone's minds and bodies were elsewhere, not far from a white and bright chamber. They all were waiting, with no exceptions. Chie, the principal and all the scholars had gone there, all together like in the happiest of the school trips. But, looking at them, they seemed to take part in a funeral, rather than in an outing. They were worried, their faces were taut, showing all their concern and all the most gloomy fear worming in their minds.

As a matter of fact, in the same moment when Irie had exited from the room of the Clinic when Rena was actually hospitalized, he was encircled by the whole class, with the members of the club in the front row. He had been asked by the girl to leave the room, since she wanted to stay alone with her father. She wanted to talk with him, privately, and nobody was allowed to enter until they had finished. Most of her friends didn't know the reason of that decision, due to the fact that there was no one with her, when she was revealed by Seohara what her parent had done in Ibaraki. The only one she had told the truth was Daijiro, who had spent all the previous night at the Clinic next to her, and who hadn't talked about it to anyone else, yet. The others, rather, guessed that she just wanted to console him, to show him that she was fine after all, and that he had not to get desperate. That was how she usually behaved with him, and with them too, in situations like that: she was always worried about the others, concerned about consoling them, even if she was the one in the hardest conditions. Of course, they were aware they might be wrong, but they would have asked her later, now they were focusing only on her health, and so they run to Irie.

Unfortunately, they realized at once that the doctor was not feeling at ease, hearing their question. And in fact, after adjusting his glasses, he looked out of the window, as if he was trying to recollect his thoughts, and therefore he asked them to follow him to his study. And there, after leaning his patient's medical records on his desk, he sat on his chair and he began to explain what he had found about Rena's state of health: "Ryuugu-san had still to undergo other exams, before being treated properly, but what we have discovered until now is not positive... Most of wounds caused by her chaser have been already cured, and they will heal without any further complication, but there is one that has caused severe damages, and I don't know if I can cure them somehow. I'm talking about the one which hit her in her back."

"Has it reached her liver, or one of her kidneys?" asked Satoshi "Does she need surgery?"

Irie shook his head: "No... I fear that medical science can't do much for her nowadays, even surgery would be useless." He took a couple of X-rays, hanging them on the whiteboard on the wall, and he pointed at a white spot, the one which represented the end of her spinal column. "That projectile had reached this zone, seriously damaging the spinal cord inside. This is a very bad injury, because this zone is the one in charge of providing control of the individual's lower limbs."

"Is there nothing you can do, then?"

"Nothing, unluckily. I've been studied neurology for years, but I am as powerless as you, and this is so disappointing... Surgery would risk only to make her state of health worse, that's a very delicate part of human body."

"And so..." Rika swallowed.

"I fear that Ryuugu-san will never be able to walk again."

The room was filled by a dead silence. Nobody dared to open his mouth, and everyone could hear only the noise caused by hot water flowing through the piping inside the walls around them. Her poor friend was forced to spend the rest of her life on a wheelchair, from that moment on... It was terrible. But they couldn't stay just there, wordless, immobile, losing heart. It was then Mion's turn to speak, to make everyone exit from that embarrassing mutism. Without smiling, she only said: "I understand, sensei. Thank you for what you have done for us."

"I'm sorry, really, Sonozaki-san. If only I could do more... But you're right, there are other patients here, and I can't get discouraged, now. With your permission." Irie passed through the little crowd in front of him, and he left the study. It had been a very short report, but formalities would have sounded absurd, in that moment.

The youngest kids of the class were feeling uneasy. What did it mean that she couldn't walk anymore? It sounded so strange to their young and immature souls that they thought about a joke, Irie was sometimes a jester. But the grown-ups were serious, they weren't laughing, so it had to be true... They didn't know what to do, so they exited in turn from the room, following the doctor and their teacher, who wanted to understand if they could finally go and see Rena, who was still with her father. The club, instead, stayed inside, discussing about the situation, and asking Daijiro more particular. Their friend explained them summarily what he knew, and what he had been told. Therefore, they all knew what Seohara had shouted to Rena.

"This is really a strange story." commented Satoko, after that the boy had finished "Now I understand what she's talking about, with her father, and why she wanted nobody else around. But don't you think that there's something irrational in this tale?"

"Hau, what do you mean?" asked Hanyuu.

"I want to say, why did he really want to kill Rena-san? The final factor which has pushed him? I don't understand..."

"Hadn't he talked about schizophrenia? That kind of people doesn't either need a logical reason, unluckily!" remarked Keiichi.

"I know that, stupid villain! Let's be more precise, then. Those past facts in Ibaraki dated back to quite a lot time ago, not less than two or three years have passed. So, why did he turn up only recently? And why did he attack only Rena-san, and not – for example – her father? That man is a person who always travels alone, he would have been a very easy target. And finally it's his fault if we have come to this, rather than Rena's."

"I have never seen it in this way, honestly." answered Shion, cuddling Satoko from behind "We haven't considered him as somebody who could be subject to risk. We could say that he has really got away with it..."

"I wouldn't say that. If this story is true, Rena will look at him with different eyes, from now on, so you're definitely wrong about that. The ruined relationship with her daughter will be the price to pay for not having told her the truth."

The green-haired girl stared at Alice, annoyed but recognizing her mistake: "I have to admit it... But do you think that the relation between them can't be rebuilt, then?"

"Well... No, thankfully. Frankly there isn't any reason not to believe they will be able to make peace. As far as I know, that man has no relatives in the countryside, apart from Rena, and the same matter goes for her, practically. The immediate future won't be an easy period, but I do think they will clear things up. They are nearly obliged to do that, and moreover they are sufficiently mature to understand that everyone can make a mistake, even a bad one."

"Seconded" commented Satoshi "But this doesn't answer to Satoko's question... Why hasn't he tried to harm Rena's father? There were many chances to attack both of them, when they were together inside their house, for instance."

"Well..." Satoko hypothesized "The wound above his eye had been caused directly by Rena, so he might believe she had become the major responsible for it. But I don't exclude that he was planning also to kill him, too, in a second moment. Or maybe Seohara-san thought that her daughter's death was an adequate punishment on its own. I've always thought that he looks the kind of man unable to react to such a loss."

"I don't think he wanted to kill both of them, the minatory letters were addressed only to Rena-san." said Hanyuu "Personally... I think that his wish to destroy only Rena-san's life followed... a sort of natural equilibrium."

"Can you explain yourself better?"

"I will try. He had already killed three boys, who were the same age as him, and as Rena-san. Why looking for an adult, after them? Daijiro-san told us he was searching for a reason to live, and so it wouldn't be strange if he had been searching also for a sense to give to those deaths. Rena-san would have been the continuation of that series of events, and everything would have seemed more "coherent" to him, if I you allow me to use this term. Is it clear? I hope so."

"Hmmm..." Rika commented, perplexed "We have no info enough, to tell if that's the truth. That's quite a delirious point of view, in my humble opinion, but we were dealing with an insane and desperate guy, so I can't exclude this chance. Yes, you could even be right, Hanyuu, but this speech would make really sense if the first murder had been involuntary. If you take someone's life on purpose there is already a motive behind and you don't have to seek one, but it would be different if, for example, there had been an incident in the beginning, and not a real killing. Especially because, if I well remember, the first one who died had been Seohara Koji, his brother. A death with no sense would have pushed him to give it one."

"Do you think so?" Hanyuu frowned "Does anybody remember how the first ones had been found?"

"I do" answered Satoshi, who in the past had read all the various records with Shion, to find something which could be useful to help Rena. Only the two of them did it, they agreed that Satoko was too young to have that kind of reading, boring, heavy and full of scabrous details. "Those documents claimed that his head had been smashed... But the murder weapon had never been found. There were no traces on his head, no fragments at all, so they had guessed it was something metallic, like a small pipe, or a baseball bat... Something which usually doesn't broke, not like wood or earthenware."

"Hadn't they thought about an incident?"

"No... They had written it was hardly ever possible. I don't remember all the particulars, but they tended to exclude it because there were no dangerous objects, around him. They couldn't find how could he hurt himself alone, there. And moreover, one of his closest friends had been stabbed that same day, so they thought about two murders, committed eventually by the same person."

"Stabbed? I see, it was not an incident, so we are likely wrong..." concluded Rika, gazing at the floor disappointed.

"No, maybe you're not." replied Keiichi "You were saying that the first murder had not to be his fault, to cause all that chain of event, in the end. Had I understood well?"

"Yes, we could say it so. And I've realized what you mean. Do you think that his brother might have not been killed by him?"

"More or less. What if the murderer of the first crime had been someone else, who knows... What about the other two boys? Everyone has always excluded them from the list of the possible suspects, but it's less absurd than how it can look like at a first glance. They had already told us that one of them had some... not very advisable contact? He used to operate in the underworld, and he wasn't unknown to a lot of criminals."

"You are talking about Shikoku-san, I remember that part of the records." said Satoshi "So, might it be that this person was the one who killed Seohara Koji-san, and that his brother took only revenge on him, before going crazy completely?"

"This is what I'm thinking. Don't forget that in the beginning he had an alibi about the first murder, he was elsewhere when his brother had died, but we all thought it was a fake one, after what had happened in the following months... But what if not? He might have simply run into his corpse, without killing him, and his mind had collapsed, not being able to handle the past facts which were pursuing him. Both his brother and Shikoku-san belonged to the group which had assailed Rena, and he hoped to forget what he had done to her by getting rid of the other people involved in it, including Rena herself."

"Ara ara, a very charming theory, which would explain a lot of things, like the fact Rena's father has never been attacked, and the one he was so strong-minded about harming her. And it gives sense also to the long time past between the facts in Ibaraki and his attempt of revenge, he decided to come here only after her brother's disappearance. Yes, I definitely like it." Satoko added nothing else. In a normal situation she would have added some further word just to tease Keiichi, but due to the context she didn't feel like doing it. She just limited looking at Rika, who nodded and answered:

"To pretend it to be a reliable reconstruction, we should find at least a motive who could make Shikoku-san desire to kill Seohara Koji-san... I don't exclude there was one, and that things really went like what you said, but the truth is that we will never know. Seohara-san himself had claimed not to remember, too, we couldn't ask him even if he was still alive, probably, or at least we would need a good psychologist."

"In fact Flavia once had told me he had one who cured him, before escaping from Ibaraki" suggested Alice "She had hinted at that to you too, at the police station. Who was there with Rena and me, that day? I don't remember... Oh, who cares, that's a worthless detail. So, should we contact him, to check if he knew anything?"

"I don't think it would be useful." answered Keiichi "If Seohara-san had told something important to him, he would have gone to report it, I guess, the police would have been informed of it, and then we too. Maybe Seohara-san would have even sent to a special institute for mental illnesses, in that case."

"As known as mental asylum, I'd say." commented an upset Shion, who didn't like speeches about isolating people far from their family.

"Yes... you're right. But it would have been necessary, you have seen how much dangerous was he. He wasn't a stupid, at all. He had prepared a subterfuge who had trapped Rena, who is not a bird-brain for sure. He had created an aura of terror around her, like in the most sophisticated of the plans. But at the same time, when he was in front of Rena, he acted like a wild beast, apparently without either thinking about what he was doing. It must sound absurd, but his cleverness and his fierceness coexisted within him, and they caused no inner conflicts. Don't you agree it's strange?"

It was, from an external point of view, but Rika and Hanyuu knew it was more usual than what the others could imagine, since they were coming to terms with the Hinamizawa Syndrome. The two girls still kept in mind what had happened in the previous worlds, when Shion had invited Satoko and Rika to the Manor, claiming to be Mion and deceiving everyone with a simple but effective trick, and then she had tortured her victims with inconceivable ferocity. And when Rena had trapped all of them inside the school, with a bomb which had exploded in so many worlds... Only once Keiichi had been able to neutralize it, the time when she had fought her on the roof. When insanity grabs you completely, it uses all your own abilities to drive you to the disaster, even your brain which should be your greatest barrier and defense against it. Yes, Rika could well understand what Keiichi meant with those words. Of course, she couldn't start talking about the past Hinamizawa, so she only said it was possible, due to the effects of the Syndrome on the human body.

"Ah, sure, since we are talking about this" Giancarlo interrupted her "There's something else which doesn't figure. When may he have contracted the disease? I want to say, until he was in Ibaraki he was "healthy", excluding his arising madness. But then he had already gone mad when he entered Hinamizawa for the first time."

"Please continue." Rika said.

"We could say... how can you tell which are the effects of the Syndrome, in his case? Were his actions the fruit of his initial craziness, or of the influence of the parasite on his brain? Don't forget that they were talking about schizophrenia, but then there should have been moments when he was "normal". Instead... Nobody had never seen him around here, until two days ago. As if he _always _wanted to hide himself... as if he _always_ was insane, out of control."

"Get to the point."

"You were saying he was carrying the signs of the disease, before, and yesterday we have all seen how he had torn his throat apart, but... When might he have shown the final symptoms? He had surely the parasites in his body, it's unavoidable once you come here without the vaccine they gave to Alice and me. But you had also told us that he had to go away from Hinamizawa, to reach that state of unstoppable insanity, it's an essential condition. So... Personally I don't think he has ever left the village, or the surrounding area. Nobody had seen him back in Ibaraki, in the last period, and I guess that he had always been around here, since his obsessive target was here too."

Rika looked at him perplexed: "And so? What could I say? Maybe you're wrong, he had gone somewhere, and so..."

"I think it's not very probable. Do you remember when Flavia and Satoko-chan had found his former hideaway, inside that cave? It's within the wood, at a place far from common transport links, so it was hard for him to travel and go very far from it. No, they even told us he probably had spent most of his nights up there, didn't they, Satoko-chan?"

The yellow-haired girl nodded, and so Rika clumsily lost a bit of her patience, mentally she was moaning against him. _You should say this to Irie-sensei, not to me, then! What should I answer? That all the theories about the Syndrome have to be rewritten? I am not a medic, or a luminary!_ For just a moment, the little girl longed for renouncing to behave cutely, as she used when she was in company. She thought she wouldn't dislike that sensation: it was surely less stressing, not saying senseless things like _Nippa_ in every single situation and being definitely more natural. On the other hand, her change of attitude would have looked very curious to the others.

Thankfully, the other noticed she wasn't in the mood for that kind of speeches, and he didn't insist, saying: "I... I was only having a doubt. I can see it, we don't have to beat our brains out for this, it has no importance." And so Rika was able to keep her self-control, letting that shroud of anger fly away from her face.

The others started then to grin, and Giancarlo didn't understand why. He hadn't noticed that, in the meanwhile, her older sister Flavia had arrived with a colleague of her, and she was laughing at him from the behind, realizing how her brother could be beaten into submission by such a little girl. However, after a moment of friendly scorn, she soon turned serious, since she was her as police officer, and not only as the Rena's friend. She had to gather the available testimony about what had happened the day before, and so, since the brown-haired girl was still in her room with her father, she asked Daijiro to tell her what he knew, before visiting the unlucky patient.

His tale took no more than five minutes, Daijiro knew how to tell things concisely, without forgetting anything, and Flavia's colleague quickly noted down everything. But his report didn't seem to satisfy the policewoman. On the contrary, she looked quite puzzled.

"Have I... said anything wrong?" asked the boy in the end, noticing his interlocutor's state of mind.

"No, you haven't. But may ask you if you are absolutely sure they have pronounced those exact words?"

"I can't. I was not there when they have spoken to each other. But Ryuugu-san told me the story trying to be as precise as possible, and I believe not to have misunderstood her. Which passage makes you so doubtful, Flavia-san?"

"Well... the one about his shotgun, I think."

"In this story there are plenty of points where he used it, it was his weapon..."

"Oh, yes. I fear I haven't made myself clear. I wasn't referring to when he _used _it, but to when he _talked _about it. According to your version of events, Seohara-san had claimed that shotgun belonged to his father, hadn't he?"

"Yes. Ryuugu-san had underlined that part, when she had talked to me, so I can't be wrong about that detail."

"Well, then there is something which doesn't make sense... Nobody had informed the police of the presence of this weapon, we didn't know at all that the wanted was armed. It's a very bad fault, we are talking about the theft of a weapon, a very dangerous object! His parents had to report it immediately, as soon as they had discovered it was missing from their house."

"Do they risk to be put under arrest?" asked Rika "Nobody has told them what has become of their son, yet, and I wouldn't like to drive them to desperation."

Flavia understood the little girl's point of view, but she couldn't avoid signaling it, that was the procedure. She could ask the officers in Ibaraki to be tactful when talking with them, but she couldn't forbid them to fulfill their job. On the other hand, she feared that they could be insensible towards their sorrow, and Rika's concern had made her worried, too. What could she invent, to suggest them not to be rude...

She suddenly realized that a hand had been leaned on her shoulder. Her colleague next to her had been calling her for a minute or two, but she hadn't either got aware of him. Apologizing (and getting annoyed because it was now Giancarlo's turn to mock her), she asked him what he had to say, and the other answered: "I am pretty sure that Seohara-san has never registered a weapon under his own name. We have checked his criminal records, his economic situation, everything in short. And he resulted not to have any weapons in his house."

"Seohara-san... In this case you are talking about his father, aren't you? Are you sure of what you're saying?"

The man nodded, and Flavia exclaimed: "Well, that's quite embarrassing... Sure, they had never told us he had stolen a shotgun from their house, and indeed I can't find a reason for them to hide it. Guilt for keeping a weapon without registering it? Too complicated and not credible at all, and moreover we would have discovered it sooner or later. Protecting their son? Perhaps understandable, but senseless. Telling it or not wouldn't have changed anything, he has already killed three people, and his situation would have been the same. Three or less than three, if what you others have guessed before is true, but it doesn't matter. He had definitely taken someone else's life, and doing it with a knife or with a gun doesn't make any difference. After all, that theft wouldn't have been the worst crime he was about to be charged of, you can see it at once."

"And moreover" added Daijiro "Ryuugu-san had told me he had used also a little ordinary gun. If his father had no weapons at all, he had taken it somewhere, exactly like the shotgun."

"The gun he had thrown down the gorge, yes, I remember it. I have already ordered to search for it, you know, the earlier we find it the better. Even though I fear that, if it fell from that height, it has probably crumbed after the impact with the ground... Yes, I do think their parents didn't want to conceal the presence of that weapon, they really didn't know anything... And that's why the fact the shotgun doesn't exist anymore is a real pity too. We won't be able to identify it, we will never know where it comes from."

"Shouldn't there a serial number, on every weapon?" asked Shion "It may have survived to such a fall."

Flavia sighed: "I think that the sharp boy you have described before has not forgotten to cancel it with a file, since he wanted to lie about their provenance. I haven't examined the various finds yet, and I will certainly verify this particular, but I am not optimist about this chance."

"I agree with you" observed Rika "Even because I am sure... that someone has helped him, during all this time."

Everyone turned at her, surprised. Why was she so sure of that? How could she be so, all of a sudden? Hanyuu looked at her, and she imagined that it was due to what Ouka had told her at the Saiguden. That day she had declared not to have ever met Seohara, but she had anyways met who was pulling the strings of all that story, because she had said there was one, and maybe this _Mr. X _had run into Seohara... Could she trust someone who claimed to be her enemy? She wasn't sure of that, but that theory seemed to her the nearest one to the truth, rather than thinking about two independent attacks against her friends, and her world. She didn't believe in coincidences.

"Can you explain what you're saying now, Rika?" asked Satoko "Sometimes you become so frightening, when you behave so."

The blue-haired girl balanced the pros and cons, before answering. She had told nothing about her ancestor's appearance, until now, and she didn't know how the others could react to such a revelation. Maybe Keiichi would even trust her, and her other friends too, but what about the adults? The issue between Mion and Megumi about the leadership of the Sonozaki family didn't involve only that clan, despite the look, and she already knew they were going to need help from everybody, but at the same time she didn't want that someone might refuse to give them a hand because he found that story absurd. And however Keiichi might always find a way to convince them to intervene, at the right moment, so maybe it wasn't necessary to say everything, for now.

"It's a sort of... foreboding." she explained, in the end "I'm like feeling there was somebody else who controlled him."

"So, is there anyone who still desires to kill Rena?" asked Keiichi "May she be still in danger?"

"But if it was so, it would be strange." replied Satoko "Imagine they are a large group. If I were them and I brought Rena-san into that wood, I would make a mass attack, and not send a single man to try to kill her. It would be ten times better."

"Satoko got a point, undoubtedly... But I trust you, Rika." exclaimed Keiichi "You were right in the past... you will be right even today."

The others showed to agree with him, and Rika appreciated that strong faith in her. But Satoko's remark was a good one, indeed, she had to find a way to explain it. She looked around, to find where Mion was.

"Mii-chan, could you help us?"

The pony-tailed girl looked a bit absent-minded, but she answered to Rika's call: "Huh? What... what can I do for you?"

"Do you remember this summer, when I told you I was drawing a manga, and you showed us all those twists about the two factions inside the _Tokyo,_ the ones which were fighting each other to take the leadership, and which didn't hesitate to kill the Queen Carrier? We'd like to hear your point of view about this matter too, maybe you can help us to understand what's happening."

"As... as you want. Let's see..." She looked at the ceiling, trying to find out a possible theory "I must start from the fact that someone controlled Seohara, and that probably the aim of this unknown person is not harming Rena..."

In the meanwhile Alice was observing his brother. Strangely, he wasn't shoving his oar in it, reasoning was usually his specialty. Why wasn't he speaking at all, instead? It wasn't necessary, because Mion soon asked for a sheet of paper, and she started to write on it, a sign that she had thought about something, however... So, the Italian girl just looked at her friend, while intent on drawing characters and being as clear as possible.

"Here it is!" she exclaimed, in the end "It should be good enough..." She examined what she had written, with a not completely satisfied look, and in fact she quickly rolled the sheet into a ball, and she threw it into the trashcan, saying: "Nah, I'd better say it by voice of mouth, it will be simpler. You know, the conclusion I've reached is that, starting from those presuppositions, if there is an enemy who had a relationship with Seohara-san, he had probably a purpose different from his, but somewhat it was related to what Seohara himself wanted to do."

"And what should be this purpose?"

"If I knew, I would be Oyashiro-sama, or another sort of God..." Hanyuu coughed.

"The most banal hypothesis would be this mysterious person's true identity is Megumi-san... And in this case it would be easy to find out who her real target is..."

Everyone stared at Giancarlo, wordless, and then they looked at Mion. What kind of idea was that? Could it be possible? Nevertheless, the pony-tailed girl seemed a bit uneasy, hearing it, but she instantly found the strength to answer: "It's impossible, we've made deep investigations about her, and nothing suspicious came out, she certainly has never been in Ibaraki in the last years, then there is a very low chance for her to have met Seohara-san. And, on the other hand, I'd gladly hope she doesn't give to human lives such a low value... Would it have been only a mise-en-scène, in your opinion? A way as good as any other to show I am not able to protect my friends, and then neither my family? A gimmick to make me depressed?"

"I wouldn't know... Has it happened?"

A simple and cutting question, and Mion lowered her eyes. Finally, that was the reason why she was so distracted, the reason why she wasn't speaking as much as the others did. She was feeling guilty for what Rena had experienced. _How can he... _But she couldn't admit it to herself and to the others, and she soon realized that his question already contained the answer, phrased in that way and in that moment: _You haven't to feel sorry, It's not your fault. _He hadn't said it, but it was like he had. So she raised her look again, and nearly shouting she answered, steadily: "No, it has not. I am stronger than what you think. And if this was their final goal, they have miserably failed, underestimating this old lady." Knowing how prideful she was, he had touched the right chord, for once.

"This is what I wanted to hear from you." he smiled "It's one thing if you are concerned about your friends, and you don't ignore their problems. But it's different if you get paralyzed by your fear and doubts, and you decide to do nothing, terrified to do something wrong. Do you remember when Rika was spying us, and we had that little wrangle? I couldn't say to be happy to see her behind the window of my house, but we had to settle it in a way, and so we did it."

"Oh sure, how could I forget? And after it" added Flavia, ironical "You went home and you gorged on roast chestnuts..."

"I can't do anything with it." he replied, annoyed "I love chestnuts, and October is their period. Shouldn't I eat them because of your sarcasm?"

"Dried fruit... Hmph" muttered Mion, wishing to show to be in a good mood "At least Grandpa liked Ohagis and Batcha could please him by cooking them... In your case, instead, your partner should only pick them up from the ground or plucking them from the trees, and peeling them... A very few gratifying kind of cuisine."

The boy blushed, embarrassed, while Shion picked repeatedly at her sister's shoulder with her elbow, to needle her: "Onee, you shouldn't make this kind of speeches to boys, they might delude themselves, or let strange ideas come into their head..."

Mion gazed at her, apparently impassive and wordless for a moment. Then: "Oh, sure, I should be more careful." she answered, looking more amused than annoyed.

"And however" said Flavia "Personally I don't like chestnuts that much, I prefer strawberries. Maybe because I love spring much more than autumn, I was happy to eat them because it was a sign that cold days were over. But unfortunately we are in winter, now, so there are not tons of them around... But in this period I have really a craving for strawberries..."

"And why?" asked his brother "Where does this come from? Women who wish for them are often big-bellied, have you got pregnant, by chance?"

"Oh, who knows... This early morning your sister has received very good news..." she answered, sibylline, before laughing on the verge of happiness. Yes, it was clear and everybody realized it, she actually was expecting a baby, and she had just used him to change the topic.

"But why I have always to fall for this kind of little games..." Giancarlo sighed, before being swept away by the other girls, who surrounded her older sister and swamped her with questions:

"Oh my God! Is it true? Really?"

"I am so happy for you, congratulations!"

"Is he a boy? Or a girl? Or maybe do you want to discover it only when the baby's born?"

"Which name have you chosen for him? How are you going to call him? Or are you undecided? I can suggest you a couple of very good Japanese names..."

"When is he supposed to arrive?"

"Rena will be so happy, too, when we tell her, you will cheer her up!"

And so on. Especially Alice was excited, she couldn't wait being called Aunt by a little cutie-pie, but even Shion and Satoko looked enthusiast, offering themselves in advance as babysitters, when necessary.

"At least, there are good news too, even in these days." concluded Rika, who was observing her friends going on harassing the future mother with any sort of question and curiosity, giving her no respite. "But I am still worried..."

Hanyuu was next to her, and she looked at her silently, like asking her only by her eyes what she meant. And her descendant answered so: "I still can't see what the destiny has prepared for us. But... But I fear it's nothing good. We have defeated it by fighting all together, and now fate is taking revenge by hitting us one at a time." She moved from there, leaving the group, and she walked until she reached the window, looking out of it exactly like what Irie had done some minute before. "Mii-chan and the ATPC inside her blood had been the first one, the second one has been me, because of Ouka, and then it was Rena's turn. Now, I'm asking... Who comes next?"

* * *

******Author's note: This chapter, in addition to explaining what has become of Rena and closing this part of the plot, is also a reminder to the presence of the vaccine Irie had developed in the past, which works only on who had never had the Syndrome and which makes them theoretically immune to it. I am not inventing anything, the visual novel describes it. The Yamainu had it (not Takano, who had arrived at Hinamizawa before its realization), and the Sercos too. It will become very important in the next chapters, stay tuned.**


	43. Division

******43**** – Division**

_Hinamizawa, 25th February 1984_

Rena was compelled to stay at the Clinic for some time, but she wasn't so sad for that. Going home would have been awkward, for the moment. Her father and she wanted to take a few days off to reflect about what had happened, and they both thought that it was better not to meet each other, in the meanwhile. Like every good relative, the man still phoned her, sometimes, to be informed about her health, as well as about the date of her return to home, and to know if she needed anything. But they didn't talk about anything else, during those short calls. Could everything come back to normality between them, one day? Alice had said to be sure of it, and also the others hoped that, but the definitive answer was known only to the members of the Ryuugu family, and to nobody else.

Rather, there was another reason to be worried about. That morning at school, after the end of the lessons, Mion had suddenly announced she intended to go to Kiyotsu, the following day.

"How come?" asked Keiichi "That's such a little village, I never have been there..." Kiyotsu was one of the nearest villages to Hinamizawa, even nearer to it than how Okinomiya was. But it was populated by less than three hundred people, most of who were old peasants, and there was never something interesting there. Placed behind one of the mountains all around the valley, it was destitute of shops and of all modern entertainment buildings, so hardly somebody from the outside wanted to go there, and little by little the village itself had been depopulating, like what had happened to Yagouchi some time before. But there was still somebody who lived there, somebody who deserved the pony-tailed girl's attention.

"I have some relative, there, and I will use their house as place of the next meeting. Some day after Megumi-san has enjoined me to leave the leadership of the family, I had contacted the rest of the clan, making a proposal: if they agreed with me about the insanity of this feud, they could meet me somewhere, to peacefully discuss about it, and to find a quicker and more satisfying solution."

"So has anybody accepted?"

"Yes... And somebody very interesting, too. You know, they told me the root cause of the problem is going to please us with her presence."

Keiichi stared at her: "Do you mean..."

"... That Megumi-san will be there, too. She has claimed she really wants to hear what I have to say."

"Mion, are you sure it's going to be all OK? It smells fishy."

"It's a funny note, said by someone who usually is not able to dodge Satoko-chan's traps..." she answered, striving to joke "But don't worry, I am not naive, and I've made sure that they can't harm me in any way."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes. The whole family knows about this meeting, and if something bad occurs to me, well, they will pay for it. They want power like nothing else in the world, but if they hurt me to get it nobody will accept them as new rulers: they would pass for people who don't hesitate to kill the other members of the family... They have everything to lose and nothing to win, if they decide to take this old lady's life."

"I see, but you shouldn't talk so, however. Since when you have become such a pessimist? Don't keep on speaking about your death as if it's normal!"

Mion smiled: "Thank you, Kei-chan, I appreciate that. I will keep in mind what you're saying me. But don't be so concerned about my sake, still. After all, this proposal has been made by me, so they should be the ones who should fear an ambush, finally. But..."

"But?"

"But I will definitely need help. You know, I have to convince them, but I'm not sure my authority will be enough.

"So so you need a Magician of Words?" Keiichi grinned "Don't worry, _this old man_ will be on your side once again. I will find time to join you, in a way."

"_This old man_? You like stealing the others' lines, don't you? But that's fine..." Keiichi was helping her also to raise her mood, it was one of the things he could do best.

"If Keiichi-san comes, we want too." exclaimed Satoko, and Rika vigorously nodded.

"Mii-chan will be never alone, Nippa~!"

The others followed soon the two little girls' example, and they joyfully surrounded Mion to make her feel their support. Of course, Rena wasn't going to join them, she had to stay at the clinic, and probably Daijiro would have preferred to stay with her: he wasn't at Hinamizawa's school at the moment, so they couldn't ask him, but they already knew he was not that good at speaking, and he would have felt out-of-place in Kiyotsu. But their spirits were about to be with them, and the ruler of the Sonozaki family wasn't alone, as she could clearly perceive it.

"So that's settled. What time must you be there, exactly?" asked Satoshi "Shall we meet here an hour before, to go there all together?"

"It's a good idea." agreed Shion "For now, there are eight of us here. We'd need at least two more cars... Well, Ali-chan can use hers, but we have to find..."

"Sure, by the way, there's something I wanted to say." Mion interrupted her. Then, turning towards Alice, she said: "Ali-chan, I have to ask your brother and you to stay here at Hinamizawa."

It was unexpected, and the girl observed her perplexed: "Why?"

"I... I want you not to come. I prefer so. The house we are going to stay in is not a huge building, and there will be plenty of relatives. You can see how bringing more people than necessary could become counterproductive, I don't want to look like an insecure girl who wants to have around her lots of friends, just to get a grain of self-confidence. And about what Shion has just said about the transport issue... well, don't worry, it won't be hard to find an alternative, I am a Sonozaki, after all, and not any one."

"Are you sure there is nothing we can do for you, then?"

"You can stay here and keep a look at what happens here. I wouldn't like to see anything unpredictable, and having someone who controls the situation is always better. Yes, this is what you can do." Indeed, this decision might have a sense, but Alice was not convinced yet. It really seemed a justification Mion had found on the spur of the moment. Nearly an excuse to keep them far from the others. If she had willingly planned it before, she would have explained it immediately, without waiting for her friends' support, and nobody would have protested. "I... I hope you don't mind about this..." she concluded.

Alice disliked not to be able to help them more effectively, but she accepted: "Don't worry, if you think we can give you a hand so, we'll do what you want. This is your village, you surely know how things go better than anyone else. Don't you agree, Nii-chan?"

Giancarlo was perplexed too, and he didn't answer. He didn't look to appreciate that decision. And in fact he raised his hand to take the floor, and he asked: "May I know why we have to stay here?"

"I've already answered to this."

"Not completely. Why did you choose _us_? I think we can be more useful together with you. You should look for somebody else."

"And so who is your candidate? Who should stay in Hinamizawa?" He was about to open his mouth, but Mion told him in advance: "Before you say it, my mother will come with us, even if Megumi-san and she hate each other. We are going to discuss about an important matter which involves all our family, and I don't intend to be influenced by that woman's whims."

"Well... If it's a problem, I can take their place, then. I don't mind staying at the village." suggested Satoshi.

"Out of discussion. Denying it would be useless, you will be soon part of the Sonozaki family, so you must be ready, and get interested about what happens inside our clan." Shion slightly blushed, hearing her sister's words, but the real source of her unease was the fact she couldn't understand why Mion was saying that.

Neither the Italian boy liked that answer. He believed his was a legitimate question, and that aggressive answer was not what he wanted to hear. He desired to know why she had chosen so, not to witness that display of authority. He went next to her, and he stared at her gaze: "Are you sure there isn't another reason, Mii-chan?"

"Do you want to know that?" she answered, after a moment of wavering "I don't want you perform another show like the one you did that day at the prefecture. Would you be happy, if you repeated what you did to Nabiha-san, and then you ran away desperate and desiring to die? You are already lucky that Daijiro-kun is a judicious person, and that he doesn't feel any resentment against you, after how you have treated his father."

"So this is your fear." he replied "Are you so afraid that I could give a thrashing to some of your relatives?"

"It wouldn't be bad, if you made Megumi-san take a step back... But you are not strong enough to do it. That woman is old and experienced, she had lived with Batcha for so many years, and she's not a small fry like Nabiha-san. You'd only hurt yourself, if you tried."

"But you're talking with me as if I wanted to behave rudely, now... I don't want to. I want to give a hand, not to cause more troubles. I will stay calm, I promise it."

"You don't understand... I don't want you with us, tomorrow."

"But why?"

"Because you'd be in the way."

"I... I'd be..."

"That's the truth. What can you do, once you arrive up there? You wouldn't be allowed to talk, probably, and Kei-chan is enough as counselor for me. There will be a lot of people supporting me, giving me advice, or protecting me, or being my bodyguard... what might your place be, inside this scenario?"

Giancarlo didn't answer, and Mion finished speaking: "I don't want to be mean, but I have to tell things like they are. I remember that once your sister had compared you to the two jokers of a deck. She was right, completely, and you must comprehend what it really means... When you play most of card game, the very first thing you do is excluding them from the rest of the deck. You include them only in special games, in special events. And this will not be a special day, at all. Please try to understand."

The other boy was visibly disappointed, but Mion had spoken, and there was no way she could change her mind. It wasn't the first quarrel between them, they all remembered the day when Mion had let off steam on him, some month before. But this time was different. Neither of them looked angry against each other, but they were like grabbed by a sort of uncertainty and uneasiness. As if they were fighting against an unknown fear.

But Alice interposed between them, trying to ease that enervating tension: "That's fine, that's fine. We will go and stay with Rena and Daijiro-kun, if that's the case. We will keep her morale high, won't we, Nii-chan?"

"If you want you can go there, Nee-chan, but I prefer to stay at home, then. I am not good at brightening up people's days, especially with this mood of mine." He reached the door of the classroom, and he just wished: "Good luck for tomorrow, then. I hope that everything goes fine, we all need it." He made the door slide, and he went out.

Rika so made a gesture to Alice, who immediately understood and left the room too, to reach her brother. The blue-haired girl, instead, asked to Mion: "Do you think it's a good idea? Finally, he didn't want to do anything bad, and you have hurt his self-regard."

"I don't question his good faith. On the contrary, I didn't want to mock him, but... to protect him."

"From what?"

"From himself. I don't want him to suffer. Do you remember that day at the prefecture? He had run away, regretting how he had treated Nabiha-san. And the day he had shown me his... his scars..." The others knew about it too, now, Alice and Flavia had told them the whole story. So, they were beginning to understand how Mion was feeling like, while she was sitting on her chair: "I can't be wrong, this time. There is a dark side within his character, I am scared by it... and I am not the only one. Also Rena has confirmed this fear to me, she had the same opinion about him, and she told me once. There is something inside him which is slowly consuming and corrupting his soul."

Rika looked at Hanyuu, who shrugged, as claiming to have never noticed anything about it. So, blaming her useless ancestors, she asked Mion: "And what is there, in your opinion?"

"I am not sure of it yet. That's why I had asked Rena's opinion about him. And she answered something which made me think a lot. The problem is not _the presence_ of something... rather it's _the absence _of it. In his soul there is a big void, similar to a black hole which doesn't let light pass. There's something he definitely lacks, something he has never had during all his life."

"And what is it?"

"I don't know, and neither Rena does." she looked at his desk "Probably no one can answer to this, neither he could. That must be why his sisters would like him to have a girlfriend, they hope to plug this sort of gap in this way."

_Fortunately Irie has vaccinated him. If Mii-chan is right, I don't want to think about what would happen if the Syndrome got him..._

While Rika was reflecting about this, Mion continued: "I know he's fighting against this obscure side: the day when he brought my repaired doll back to me, I was sure he had made it also because he felt somewhat sorry. He had just told me about his arm, and he wanted to show me the best part of himself, to prove he was not only a sad boy unable to feel happiness. He doesn't like himself, when he gets angry and evil like at the prefecture, and I know that his true self is much more gentle and kind than it. But I can't be sure he's able to restrain himself, when he's pressed. And then I think he'd better stay here, far from the aunt for now. I couldn't tell what would occur, otherwise... The worse part of him could take the control, if something goes wrong."

"I see... But you are going to... protect him also at the cost of being seen like a tyrant, by him? At the cost of forcing him to hate you? Because you have not been kind with him, I fear."

Mion lowered her head, sadly: "I... I don't think he's that genre of boy. He creates an impression worse than how he really is. He has never imposed his will on mine, each time we have debated during all these months, and in the end I am sure he will accept my decision. He reminds me... Batcha, in the end. He's not a bad guy, if he was he would have behaved more rudely, earlier. He's only a clumsy boy who is not able to relate well to other people. He may look a bit cynical and cold with them, but it is only because he's so also with himself. No, especially with himself."

Shion observed her sister. That speech had made her curious. _It's strange how people can change opinion and tastes, sometimes... It's typical of Rena finding out these feelings, but it's not like Onee doing the same. I wonder how she has been able to get it. She looks so sincerely concerned... _And so she didn't take much attention to what the other twin said afterwards: "But even if I am wrong. I am ready for it. Even if he nurses a grudge against me, I will accept it. Power means responsibility, and then it means also the willingness to deal with some necessary sacrifice. This is my job, they had told me what I was about to run into, and I am prepared for it."

_I only hope we won't have to handle sacrifices, that's all we need... _thought Rika. Ouka's words and menaces still buzzed around in her head, and they absolutely didn't intend to leave her.

…

The following day, as expected, they went to Kiyotsu. Alice, Rena and Daijiro were at the Clinic, while Giancarlo had stayed at home waiting for news. All the others, instead, went to the little village on the mountains, got into cars which were following a narrow dirt road.

Mion was alone, on Kasai's car. Not having someone to chat with was not a problem, her head was already full of thoughts. She didn't comprehend why Megumi wanted her not to be the ruler of the family anymore... Did she wanted to take the power for herself? But she was already an aged woman, and she had had no sons. She was in her late 60s, she was going to live no more than two decades, and after her death, what would happen? A new feud, very probably, after all if she got able to oust her, it would be the evidence that everyone can fight against everyone within the clan, and it would be the end of it. Even in the case she designated an heir from one of the other branches of the family, a lot of people wouldn't recognize him, and they wouldn't obey to him. Definitely, whether she aimed at taking the leadership or she rather wanted to leave it to someone else as she had officially declared, the Sonozakis would quickly fall in decay, with no chance of resurrection, and this couldn't allow it to take place.

But was she able to assure a better future for them? At the moment the other members of the family were looking at her like at a young woman who hadn't a husband, yet, the Sonozakis were a very traditionalist clan. And even if she wanted to please them, who could she choose as partner? Keiichi had refused her, in the end, and she had to exclude him from that list. Satoshi was property of her sister, and she would never dare to steal him from her. And Giancarlo was not considered on principle. What about Daijiro, then? He looked an earnest boy... but he was out of her hands too. He used to spend an incredible amount of time with Rena, he always looked for her, each day he came to Hinamizawa, and also Rena was always happy to see him... He was her only reason to smile, in this hard period at the Clinic. Mion didn't believe in love at first sight, but she had to change idea, observing them. They made a fine-looking couple, indeed. _I wish them good luck..._

Where might she look for a partner, then? A marriage of convenience, with an unknown man coming from who knows where? No, she didn't want that. He could turn out to be a mean and violent person, in the worst of the cases, and anyways she desired someone she respected, at least. Someone from Okinomiya, then? She had a lot of friends living there, it could be a chance. But it was not satisfying... _Sob, I am really a disaster, when I deal with boys..._

"Mion-san, we have just arrived. I wish you to meet with success." said Kasai, suddenly. Mion revived, and she got out of the car.

Together with her friends, she met the relatives present there, greeting them cordially. And then they caught sight of Megumi, always next to her silent servant, the one who days before had ripped Mion's dress and who had shown to the rest of the audience the tattoo she still carried on her back. Kasai was told to be always hanging on her coat-tails, this time they would have avoided unpredictable and unpleasant surprises.

Not far from them, another man was staring at the incoming group of boys. They had never known him in person, but the Sonozaki twins had already seen a photo painting him. It was Megumi's second husband, Goemon. A common old person, surely he was more than 70. Shorter than his wife, due to his slightly bowed back, his upper lip was covered by thin gray mustache. He held a walking stick into his right hand, and his walk seemed hesitant and strained. But his lively and rippling gray eyes betrayed an intelligence out of ordinary. Mion didn't rely that demure look, and she got ready for the fight, entering the room. Shion came after her, but she was unexplainably concerned. When she had observed him in that photo she hadn't that impression, but now... _I don't know why, but it's like I have already seen him somewhere..._

The meeting started, and Megumi was the first one speaking: "Before we discuss about what you want, I would like to condole with your group for what has happened to your friend Ryuugu Rena-san. It's something we'd always prefer to never happen, but we have to deal with this unfortunate events. I am sure it has been a hard blow for you, Mion-san... She was in danger, and have arrived there when it was too late..."

"You dirty..." Mion muttered "She's insinuating that it's only my fault..." Bet she took back her self-control. She had to speak, trying to convince the others to join her side. The evening before, Keiichi and she had written a speech she had quickly learned, and they were sure it was the best possible to reach their purpose. Was it really so? She couldn't say that. She was expecting questions, and remarks, especially by Megumi, or by someone else next to her. Instead, she was just listening. The pony-tailed girl was going on scanning her, to see if there was a sign of reaction, but nothing occurred. The only questions she had to answer to came from other participants, and they were nothing hard or dangerous to handle, for her.

She finished after about twenty minutes, and she asked finally if there were further doubts. Had she convinced them? She was going to know. But a hand was suddenly raised, and it belonged to Megumi. Here she was, ready to move: "Yours are nice and resounding phrases, but how can we know if they mirror the truth? We don't want words, but deeds, and therefore I have a proposal for you."

_A proposal? _"What are you planning to do?"

"First tell me if you accept."

"I'm sorry to be impolite, but I don't trust you. I want you to tell me the details, before."

"It sounds reasonable. Goemon, could do explain it?" she stood up with a solemn movement "In the meanwhile, I must ask everybody else to exit from here. I don't want someone to interfere, or influence them."

"I heartily hope this is not a trap." mumbled Akane.

"I will go out with you, don't worry. If something bad happens to her, well... I am about to have a horrible time."

Keiichi and Rika didn't like that idea. They still preferred to stay, but Mion said it was fine, and they finally obeyed, reluctantly, following the others. There were only the two of them inside the old hall, now. The green-haired girl then stared at him, asking: "So, what do you want me to do, to convince you and make this story end once and for all?"

"I have thought about it for a while, to be honest, and finally I've reached the conclusion you should prove what you have said. You have said your aim is to protect us, so I want to see if you're able to protect someone."

Mion said nothing, waiting for the other to continue. "Yes, sure, I must tell you more... I will make sure not to forget anything, it's your right to be treated so. Make yourself comfortable, this won't be a short story. Do you mind if I light my pipe, please?"

Mion shook her head, and he took a wooden pipe and a match from his pocket. Then, looking at smoking coming out of it, he started speaking: "You know, we have studied the village and his inhabitants for a long, long time. I could even say we know about what happened the last summer more fully than what you can do. We even are aware of the existence of the Syndrome."

The girl's ponytail jumped ahead her, as her whole body winced. Why was he talking about it?

"We still belong to the Sonozaki family, so we know how real world goes... But unlike the main branch, we know how to avail of our resources. In the past, I was already told about the presence of a secret organization, whose aim is the mere obtaining of power, through the most various and disloyal means. The confirm arrived from that woman... Takano-san. Our records claimed that she looked involved in that story, and it was easy to make her reveal everything she knew. We neither had to menace her, we only met her a day she was alone, and she didn't make a stand. She was so weak and fragile, that day, hers must have been a painful drama."

"_Tokyo _organization is not made of many members. They have a lot of collaborators, but the number of people who really has power is limited. Thanks to Takano-san's descriptions, we were able to trace one of the collaborators, a grey-haired woman who used to be called with dozens of names, and we made him realize that, in order to avoid binds, they had to do two things: tell us what they knew about that story, and give us all the material they still had about the affair. And in order to be more persuasive, we got rid of one of their subordinate, the one we had discovered. Quite a spectacular execution, maybe uselessly showy, but it did the trick. A few time later I was given what I had asked, and they would have never taken their revenge, people like them may look frightening, but basically they are only scared to lose what they have, and to keep it they are ready to everything, even to make no further questions. I had promised to no longer stop by them, once I had obtained what I looked for, and they did what I ordered them."

Mion didn't understand why he was wasting time with that tale. She couldn't wait hearing the most important part, which had necessarily to arrive, but a bad presage was making her wish not to ever heard it.

"I got finally a large pack" Goemon went on "filled with files and strange substances... They were what I was expecting. All the documentation about the Syndrome, and a little Easter Egg. While waiting for Irie-sensei's results, they had asked a microbiologist to realize a new version of the parasite. Unlike the original one, it could infect a human body only by direct contact with the subject's blood, but it was five times more aggressive and harmful. A real killer organism. Irie-sensei knew nothing about it, but its research was still useful, _Tokyo_ still wanted to know if they could really use it as a deadly weapon, or if it was something unmanageable. They were waiting for him, before using or selling it. And do you know the best part? I was given some syringe full of a substance containing that parasite..."

"Oh my..."

"Yes, you have understood what they gave me. An incredible resource, whose value had been underestimated even by them, but fear is never a good counselor. I was overjoyed, but I had to test it. Who might I choose? If I had taken a member of your village, you would have noticed his disappearance, and I could have run into some nuisance. But there was an individual who could suit these requirements without causing any trouble. I accidentally was told about him that day you all were at the prefecture... That boy who wanted to kill your friend."

"Seohara-san?"

"Ah, was that his surname? Frankly I had never asked for it, it was not significant. But that day he had been able to escape from the crowd, and I had to find him before you could robbing me of such a valuable guinea-pig. I had asked my servants to look for him, and I was lucky. He was caught inside one of the little caves all around this zone, and brought in my house in Okinomiya. And there I inoculated the new parasite in his body."

"His mind got so weak... but he was still obsessed. He was already guided only by his madness, when they conduced him in front of me. His lone wish was to take that girl's life, to bring her to hell. I knew about his friends' deaths, and guessed that I could brainwash him. Making him forget what had happened to the other boys, and convince him Ryuugu-san had been the one who had killed them, somehow. Manipulating his past, namely, just to examine his reactions. But I failed. He has always refused that theory, and not because it was impossible. It was likely because he still felt alike being the real murdered, or maybe because he had watched them while they were dying, and he couldn't forget."

"It was so curious... Human minds are so full of surprises. Materially, he didn't charge her, somebody else had committed the gesture, and he was conscious. But at the same time, even if she was the last responsible from his point of view, she didn't want to listen to me, even if what I was saying could give him a further reason to hate her. And going on telling him it was not true was merely damaging, he got immediately violent towards every person by him. Maybe it was one of those famous love-hate relationship. Maybe he was obsessed by her because, within his subconscious, he loved her, and in Ibaraki he had never found the bravery to confess his feelings to her... But it's too late to discover if this was the truth."

"I even was obliged to have recourse to huge amount of morphine, he didn't intend to calm down, after I had made the injection, I admit I still have to find out if it was an effect of the Syndrome or of his pre-existent craziness. He was going on shouting that his brother had been killed by his friends, and that my hypothesis would have made his revenge senseless... Anyways, I didn't know whether he was lying to himself or not, and I didn't care about it, I didn't listen to what he was shouting. I don't like trying to persuade raving mads, do you, perhaps? Then I just fed his hate towards her, or at least the part of him who hated her, doing away with the one who eventually loved her. I gave him everything he needed to realize his mortal purpose, suggesting him the best strategy to use, before letting him go the day after."

"The shotgun, and the other gun, too... SO YOU WERE BEHIND IT!" Mion screamed, standing up instinctively.

"Can you avoid to shout? It's useless, this old room has been made sound-proof. And if you don't stop I will not be able to finish my story, the best part is coming..."

"What do you mean?"

A malign grin appeared on his face: "_I want more data, I want a further test..._ That other boy would have been the perfect lab rat, nobody would have cried for his passing, but his schizophrenia forbid me to see exactly what the effects of the new parasite were. So... You know, most of your friends are here with you, protected by the presence of the other members of our family, but someone had to stay at home. Inviting everyone here was impossible. So I've ordered someone to get one of them, and make a new experiment..."

Mion turned pale, hearing him claim: "_Yes, by now... One of the people you care the most in Hinamizawa is carrying the strengthened parasite."_

"You... monster. And who have you chosen?"

"I haven't. I said to look for a new subject to test, but I didn't know who was going to remain inside the village today, and I suppose that the choice has been taken randomly, finally."

Mion's eyes began to move up and down neurotically, while she was trying to get who could have been the victim, among the ones who had stayed at the village. Kimiyoshi? They officially had never made peace, so he couldn't claim she cared him, that unlucky event had paradoxically saved him. Rena? She was maybe the closest of her friends, but she was at the Clinic, unable to move. Goemon's henchmen had to know it wouldn't be hard to keep her under control in those condition, even under the effects of the Syndrome. And moreover her father was with her, as well as Daijiro, and Alice...

_Oh, my..._ Mion realized it. There was someone who was not with them, who had decided to stay at home. The ideal target.

"G-Gi-chan..." she slowly whispered, trembling. But she immediately thought: _Wait a second, hasn't Irie-sensei vaccinated him? He should be safe, and on the other hand, if the sensei didn't know about the new parasite, this guy and his servants could be unaware of how the vaccine works, as well... _

Unfortunately, from the heights of his long life full of experiences, the other had read the flow of her thoughts: "Honestly, they may have chosen someone who carries Irie-sensei's vaccine... It would be interesting to examine. That serum is effective against the normal disease, but I don't really know how it may behave in this case, since it has to deal with the new one... Usually, in such circumstances, the antibodies have no effect at all, they just don't recognize the new pathogen and they don't attack it. In fact, if you consider flu, they always have to make a new vaccine each year, because viruses change each year, and the version of the previous winter is not good anymore."

He was mocking her, and he liked it. He stood up, making a step to approach the girl, in order to look at Mion face-to-face: "But there is something I can tell you. In the past test, I had waited a while, before administering the parasite, and so I had kept that boy in a locked hall of my house. But once I had inoculated the final disease, he had died three days after, as you can confirm on your own. I don't know if this time something might change, but more or less this is the period of time I am giving you. You have three days to save his life and his soul."

"So is Life so meaningless, for you? Are you going to kill people only for your personal satisfaction? For an experiment generated by your curiosity?" Mion was beside herself.

"After all, Seohara-san was not an angel... Nobody will shed a tear, because of his death. A long period in prison or a quick death, how can you say which is the most suitable condemn, for such a criminal? And moreover... I don't think there is a person who doesn't deserve to be punished. Or are you going to tell me you are pure people, now?"

"You are not better than him."

"You may be right. But Seohara-san's end was not only a caprice. Don't forget that he was able to fulfill the secondary task I had assigned to him: getting rid of one of your companions, and making you more strained. It wasn't a waste of resources."

"There are other ways of making people atone for the sins they have committed, don't you agree?" she roared "And now, what do you think will happen, once I tell the other what you have done?"

"You are free to do it... But I am not sure a lot of them will trust you. Who might believe to such a fantastic theory, without evidence? Maybe your friends and your closest supporters will do, but what about the other adults? Think about it. Syndrome? Parasites? It's not easy to accept, they would look at you like at a raving girl, they would even decide to leave your party, and you might obtain the opposite effect of what you want. And moreover, you have no time to throw away, I'd say."

"My friends will trust me, don't doubt about that. But then? Why have you told me all this story? You could regret it, sooner or later."

"Because Megumi knew you, and she gave me good advice. She knows that strain, pressure and stress are your worst enemy, and in fact you are already so worried about what you have been revealed that you don't know what to do. Let's see how much are you going to resist..."

"Give me only a reason why I shouldn't kill you right now. I have been taught how to fight, certainly more than you, and furthermore you are old, you would have no chance to defeat me, and you know that."

"Do you want a reason? Here it is. The fact you and I were alone here protected you from any possible trap, since everyone would have known the culprit at once. But the same goes for me, don't you think? If you kill me, you will be charged of being a very bad leader, who gets rid of her enemies in the most bloody way possible, no matter if they belong to your same family. You are not Oryou-sama, they would deny you, resolute not to allow you to do the same with them, and I will obtain my last purpose, anyhow."

Mion didn't know how to reply. He looked so self-confident, like her opponent at the prefecture, that day... Yes, that was the truth. "Now I can see it... I couldn't see how Megumi-san could have manipulated Nabiha-san, but I had only controlled her moves... not yours. Seohara-san's plan, Nabiha-san's one, and this... They all have something in common, they are well elaborated, they all consider the littlest details... You have been the one who played him along, admit it!"

Goemon answered just with a sneering smile, but the girl didn't need any further word: "So, that day you wanted everyone to move from Hinamizawa just to get the power I'm holding? Just because of the feud between you and me?"

"I use my own methods." was just his answer. His smile vanished for a moment, he didn't look to talk more about it, and neither Mion did.

She run to the door, and before opening it she exclaimed: "Seohara-san and Nabiha-san have used plans arranged by you, and they both have failed. What does make you think you will be successful?"

"The fact I'm personally handling it, now. Those two idiots were too stupid to deal with all the variables alone, but I am different, don't you think so?" he watched the hour on the clock on the wall, and he added: "My dear Mion-sama, please run, time can fly away fast, sometimes... You understand, I could decide to trap the new guinea-pig. I should think about this chance, I could make some new and better calibrated tests. But at the same time it will be interesting, observing how he or she will behave in the open air with such a parasite eating away at the brain of its host. And, of course, I can't wait to see how you are going to rescue him..."

Mion didn't want to stay with him a second more. The door roughly slid, and she ran breathlessly to the others. Thinking about accepting or not his challenge was now useless, the gauntlet had been thrown down, and Goemon had involved people she wanted to stay extraneous to that affair. She would have never forgiven him.

She reached the others, and she immediately searched for one of her uncles, the owner of the building.

"Oji-san! The phone, please! Where is it?"

She had grabbed him by his shirt, and due to the surprise he didn't answer instantly. Keiichi and Rika, instead, went to her, and they asked what had happened, terribly worried about her behavior. Something horrible had occurred, but they couldn't know what.

"YOUR TELEPHONE, PLEASE!" she screamed, crying, without either hearing her friends. The middle-aged man raised his left arm, pointing at a door, and the pony-tailed girl rushed to it, followed by the others, and when she noticed it she immediately seized the receiver, and she made his finger bleed while she was dealing the number, making the disc rotating as fast as she could.

…

A moment later, inside the Sercos' House, the phone rang. It rang, and it rang, and it rang, for more than three minutes, without intending to stop. But it was useless. Nobody answered, nobody could, simply because nobody was there to do it.


	44. Linked in pain

******44**** – Linked in pain**

_Hinamizawa, 26th February 1984_

"Ali-chan, please! Wake up!"

Satoko was trying to make her revive, after bringing a glass full of water and making her drink it. They had just arrived there, after that Mion had asked them to go headlong back from Kiyotsu. During the trip, she had told in dot points the challenge Goemon had put out, before hiding behind a veil of silence she didn't look to want to exit from. And therefore, it fell to Keiichi's lot to inform Alice, once they reached their destination. A short, but sorrowful tale. Comprehensibly, what had happened to her brother had been the worst news she could ever hear, and the shock was so painful to make her faint. Fortunately, Irie moved quickly enough to grab her, avoiding that her head hit the cabinet behind her, and she leaned her on the ground. In the meanwhile, Keiichi had quickly gone inside one of the empty rooms of the Clinic, to take a pillow and place it under her head, while the girls were trying to make her awake.

They were still at Irie's clinic, in fact. The house where the Sercos lived was empty, Giancarlo was not inside anymore, and Alice hadn't come home yet, she was still with Daijiro and Rena, so they had to go there to inform her about what had probably become of were no doubts that something bad had taken place down there, the lock of the entrance door of their house had been forced. Probably someone had entered inside, and he had found a way to immobilize him, maybe with a soporific gas, before injecting the parasite and going away undisturbed.

But there wasn't time to think about hypothesis. Alice couldn't stay in that house anymore, for the moment, it looked too dangerous. They had already decided to send her at the Manor, it was safer, and there was always a free room for friends and guests, there. Moreover, for a girl with frayed nerves like how she was now, it was surely better to live together with someone else, rather than in a house where everything reminded her brother, the one she was used to live with.

Gradually, the fainted girl was waking up. Shion was looking at her, and she was thinking that she could understand how she was feeling. She would lose her temper as well, if something bad happened to Mion, or to Satoshi, or to Satoko, who had become a sort of sister-in-law by now. She wouldn't hesitate to go to those pitiless monsters, to cut their head off with a single strike, with the katana her family had owned for generations.

Slowly, Alice stood up, helped by Keiichi who was holding her hand. She looked at her right and at her left, lost, as trying to find a reference point, something she could lean herself on. And then she walked towards Mion, who had watched the scene without saying or doing anything.

She went over her, saying nothing, neither giving a glance at her. And all happened under Rika's careful look, who had thought that Alice wanted to tell her something, but evidently that wasn't her intention. Rather, the girl approached the door of the room they were in. She looked to desire to exit.

"Where do you want to go?" asked Satoshi.

"At home. There is a thing I'd like to pick up, before doing anything else."

"And what?"

"I..." suggested Daijiro "I have half an idea about what. You are going to take a weapon, aren't you?"

"A weapon?" exclaimed Rika. That speech wasn't pleasant at all "What are you thinking about, Ali-chan?"

"I... I must..."

"... Take revenge?" Keiichi completed her sentence. "I understand your feelings, really. What you're doing is something human, and I am not blaming you for that... But you shouldn't. First of all, there is not much you can do alone, you have seen there is even a bodyguard with them. Furthermore, you neither know where they live exactly, you know only that they are from Okinomiya, but the exact address is unknown for you, and you will find nobody here who is about to tell you. Especially after you have shown such a murderous wish."

"I... see... But..." she closed her eyes, and she finally overcame herself. She wasn't so instinctive as Shion, and block her was easier "But I still want to have it by me. This will be hard, and I want to have a "support", even if it's just a psychological one. You know, when I was little, when I started to play fencing, I did it for an exact purpose. I had promised to myself that I would have protected my family and Nii-chan with that, and the fact I've been useless is so frustrating."

"You are not said to be useless" replied Keiichi "There is a lot you can do for him. You are the one who knows him most, and you can say to us where you think he's likely hiding, now."

"Why aren't you thinking they have captured him, instead? Just giving him that damn parasite and running away would be stupid, in my opinion. They have surely taken him away, waiting for... the most suitable moment to do what they are planning."

"They haven't decided so, apparently. Goemon-san claimed to want to see what he was about to do, once he had been left alone. Hadn't he said it, Mion?"

The pony-tailed girl just turned at who had spoken to her, nodding very slightly with her head. She had never opened her mouth, after they had reached the Clinic, and she didn't look feeling like to do it. She seemed apathetic, not interested in what was happening around her, and the others didn't know if they had to be more worried about the boy far from them or about the girl next to them.

Also Rena could look at her face. After all, they still were in her room, they had looked for Daijiro and Alice breathlessly, to check the situation and tell them the last news immediately, so she was aware of the situation, too. And there, sit on her bed, she could reflect. She remembered the day when Alice had aimed at Mion with the sword, menacing to harm her in case something bad would have occurred to her brother because of her. But could be this Mion's fault, in the end? Probably no, of course she didn't want him to undergo that destiny, and on the other hand neither Alice thought that, at least she didn't look angry against her, on the contrary. But rather, maybe Mion herself believed to be the guilty... _Might it be the truth? Is she cursing herself for not being able to protect the inhabitants of her own village? We have to admit that it was Mii-chan who forced him to stay at Hinamizawa, far from the others. If that's the case... Poor Mii-chan, she's thinking to be the worst leader all over the world... But she shouldn't be so severe against her. It's not only her fault. For example, if only he had decided to come here, with his sister, with Daijiro-kun, and with me, instead of staying alone... We had to convince him to come here... No, it wouldn't have made that difference, they wanted to inoculate the disease to someone, no matter who the victim was, they would have changed simply their target. But Mii-chan shouldn't be however so pessimist, we can still save him, in a way, and if we succeed we will raise her spirit, too. I guess they have arranged this plan also to destroy what has left of her self-confidence and to win this war more easily, and we can't allow this. _Mion was depressed, and hearing that she was the responsible of what had happened only made things worse, it had no importance whether the charge was coming from another person or from herself.

Rika and Hanyuu were worried, too, but for another reason. Ouka had told her Hinamizawa was about to be destroyed... but how? That fight really seemed to involve only the clan, some individual apart like Rena and Giancarlo... How could this bring to the end of the village? There was a part of the plan they surely haven't got yet, and this was making them even more anguished.

In that moment of panic, Keiichi was maybe the only one who didn't lose his temper: "Now calm down, mates! We have to think about some good idea, and doing it in the cold light of day will give better results. Now, since he's not locked up anywhere, where might he be? Where might he have gone?"

"He must have run somewhere" answered Satoko "He's gone away from his house quite recently, so let's exclude zones too far from there. Moreover, I don't think he has ever visited the mountains, or the woods. They would be good places to hide himself, after all Seohara-san had done the same, but he doesn't know those lands, as far as I know, and if he still has a grain of mind he will stay far from them. He would be trapped easily by one of mine snares, otherwise."

"That would be nice" replied Rika "but I fear it won't happen. The Syndrome doesn't clear out its victims' mind, and he likely stayed clear-headed enough to know that... We must seek elsewhere, I think."

Keiichi nodded: "He probably had a well-defined purpose, to go away immediately after being hit by the new disease, and there is no reason to think this purpose is far from Hinamizawa. We must focus our efforts around here. But hasn't anybody seen him, somewhere?"

"I guess not, damn... You see, people suffering from final levels of the disease act violently: if some person had seen him, he would have reported it to the police, or to other villagers. Within Hinamizawa voices run fast, you know it too, and we would have been told about it in the same moment we entered the Clinic."

"I understand... That ugly... Mion, we have to make deep researches about this Goemon-san. We must know everything about him, and not only about him or his wife, but about everyone who has any bond with him. We can't commit the same mistake twice!"

"We are going to do it" answered Shion "But not now, we have more important things to care about. Even if..."

"Even if?"

"... I've a suspicion, and I really can't get it out of my mind... I am sure... I am sure to have already seen him somewhere."

"He's a relative of yours, that's not that surprising."

"I KNOW THAT, KEI-CHAN!" she reacted, nervously "But consider this: his wife and he had always stayed far from the other branches, in the last years. Goemon-san in particular had _never_ attended one of the meetings Batcha had periodically organized, after he got married with her, I suppose this was her wish. And at the same time I had to spend a lot of time at the Academy, far from the rest of my relatives. I mean, I shouldn't have ever run into him, there wasn't any chance to do that... But I'm feeling like I have already met him, elsewhere... And not for a familiar issue."

"So, the only chance for you to have done that... Is having met him before he joined the Sonozaki clan." observed Rena "Before his marriage, namely."

"I understand..." that theory made the green-haired girl think for some second, before saying "But I've never known someone named Goemon, that's why I'm so puzzled. Of course, I've met people who never told me what was their name, like every other normal person... But..."

"We will deepen the matter, one day." Daijiro interrupted them "But now we have to think about more urgent problems. We need help to find where is he... But where's your family, Alice-san? A relative of your is in danger, and nobody comes from your homeland to give a hand to rescue him? This is an unforgivable behavior! Are they so insensible?"

"It's not that easy, don't be harsh towards them." answered Irie, who was still with them "You are forgetting about the Syndrome. If someone comes to Hinamizawa without being vaccinated before, he wouldn't be allowed to leave, once there isn't any reason to stay anymore. You'd have to send a vaccine to their mother country, and you'd have to wait for the vaccine itself to have effect. Considering all the necessary time to perform all these steps, nobody would be able to arrive before a month, greatly too late to be able to do something."

"So, haven't you either informed them about what's happened?"

"Not for now" answered Alice "It would be only a useless concern, for them, there is nothing they could do, we are not rich, or powerful, and nobody of us is a strong warrior. They would be mere strangers in a foreign land, exactly like what we were when we had arrived here. What could they do, once here? As Irie-sensei has just explained, it would cause only new troubles."

"I see..." commented Shion "This damn vaccine requires a lot of time and procedures. Even if this it was not that useful, this is the paradox."

"Shion-san!" exclaimed Satoko, who had noticed how Irie had dejected hearing her words.

"No" said the doctor, caressing the little girl's head "Your friend is right, don't blame her. Surely, the Syndrome is having effects on him, he wouldn't vanish without a good reason, otherwise. I... need to apologize to all of you."

"You haven't to." replied Rena "This is a different disease, if Rena has well understood, so you couldn't fight a parasite you didn't either know before today. Nobody can deny you have already made a miracle with the old version of the Syndrome, you can't pretend to do the impossible. It's not your fault."

"I agree with Rena" added Rika "But even if it's different this is still the Hinamizawa Syndrome, so some elements must be the same. There must be something on his brain, something which is his greatest worry, something which could obsess him... What might it be? Finding it out would be a huge help."

"Hard question to solve..."

"Maybe, the scars on his arm?"

"It's possible. But what would be the effects on his behavior? He can't say it's fault of someone who is still alive, he can't look for someone because of this."

"Could he look for someone he thinks to be the guilty? He surely could search for Megumi-san, even, nobody of us loved her, and neither him."

"No, he would have to face what we had talked about earlier. He doesn't know where they exactly live, and he'd have to defeat their bodyguards first, even if perhaps he doesn't care this last point, now."

"Are you thinking he could attack them, then?"

"No, I am not saying it. I've just told their address is known only to the Sonozaki clan, within Hinamizawa. Isn't it true, Mion?"

Mion didn't move, as if she hadn't either heard Keiichi's words. So, the boy preferred to go on speaking, to avoid the disheartening atmosphere which might otherwise occupy the room: "However, we must organize a proper research: the fact happened just some hour ago, so he can't be far from here. Rika-chan, you and Mion please go to the village and ask for help, it's better not to leave any of us alone, and the village will listen to you. Sensei, please call the police, and tell Flavia-san what's happened, she will give us all the help she can arrange. In the meanwhile, we will be split into two groups, and we will start the research, while waiting for the reinforcements. Any question?"

No questions. Everybody was ready to help, but they were terribly concerned, the fact Rena had lost the usage of her legs despite their efforts was not a good sign. And moreover that meant stopping temporarily to take care of Mion's situation, of the feud within her family which was putting her through the wringer. They were aware of it, it was a painful decision, but it was the only affordable one, they knew that pursuit wouldn't have taken much time, Goemon himself had told her that she had no more than three days, and after them they would have begun again to deal with the feud, hopefully with Giancarlo back on their side. But anyways, Mion's mood looked low. She looked depressed, she was depressed. Abnormally in low spirits. Was it natural? Was it just an effect of her frame of mind, or rather...

Rika had suddenly a suspicion, and she wanted to make sure. She approached the doctor, and she asked him to stoop, since she wanted to whisper something in his ears. Irie obeyed, and Rika said: "Please, sensei, ask Mii-chan to stay at the Clinic for a moment, after we have finished, and check her actual level of ATPC."

"Are you sure? Maebara-san has just told..."

"I know what Keiichi-kun has decided. But don't worry, Hanyuu will come with me if you're concerned about my sake. Mii-chan, instead, should stay here, I think, it's much better for her."

"Hmm. If you insist, I will follow your suggestion..."

"Please do. I have a bad presage..."

_..._

_It's beginning to rain. Yes, I knew that, the sky was dark, when I raised my head to look for the Sun, so it wasn't unpredictable. Luckily I was fast enough to arrive here, this is a good refuge, those drops of water will never reach me inside here, screened by that cold wind, and nobody will reach me here, as well. The only one who could do that is actually blocked, don't I know that, maybe?_

_Yes, Sun is not here anymore. That's right, that's how it must be. There is no Sun for me, there has never been Sun for me. My Sun has gone away that day when I was four. They have crushed down my Sun, they have decided I couldn't be a happy person, and indeed since that day I've become a son of darkness. They have forced me to become what I actually am, with no chance to choose. And all of them have accepted this state of affairs. My Grandma had told us I was a nocturnal jessamine, while Alice was like a sunflower... She had told me I could only flower in the night. Surely she intended to please me, I don't question her good intention... but with that metaphor she made me understand that I would have never reached sunlight. It would have been too hot and dazzling, it would have made me burn._

_But at least it had helped me to accept my situation, that time. I have accepted myself, and that was the most important thing. I wouldn't have ever been happy like a normal person, I wouldn't have been happy like how Alice is destined to be. But I could always obtain a pinch of happiness, thanks to this acknowledgement. My life would have been still decent, one not completely worthless, that was what I thought._

_But will my other self ever accept this? The one who has humiliated Nabiha, the one who was feeling pleasure while I was telling my story to Mion... He likes to see me suffering, he wants me to go on suffering, like a titan proud of being a rebel, not obeying to Zeus. He doesn't mind about being condemned because of this, on the contrary this is like a sign of self-satisfaction. Yes, there is a part of me who likes to be cursed. But why? This is what I don't understand. Should I be proud of what I had to go through, in the past? Maybe... But I can't be proud of what I have to go though now, and least of all of what I will have to go through in the future, if I go on so. I can live with it, but I can't be happy for it. That would be inhuman. _

_That's why I'd really like to fight against this destiny. But I don't know how to do that. I want the others to see I am not that kind of sad person, that I __am not only that... That's why I wanted to repair Mion's doll, that was my attempt to show the light side of me. I was aware that my story had made her understand she hadn't been the only one who had to deal with a mark on her body, but on the other hand that wasn't a pleasant tale, and I didn't want her to think I was only a sad lone boy. Then I wanted to do something joyful, I was sure she would have been so happy thanks to that present, and I was right. I was so pleased to see her so, it was the proof I can also make people smile, and not only drive them to melancholy or desperation. I was so happy to see her smiling, I wanted to let her notice the best side of me._

_But... the others didn't ask me anything about that. No questions, no comments... nothing. As if it didn't happen. Perhaps they have appreciated it, but they haven't shown that feeling. Neither Alice, or Mion, that's why I am so troubled... Was it normal? Or was it the same, for them? Having a sad... friend rather than a happy one, is it just the same? Don't they look after my mood, my morale, in the end?_

_I remember Mion and Shion's birthday... I had noticed they had swapped their identities, and they had looked so shocked, when I told them. Mion claimed it was because of a fault of her sister. But the truth was that I had the impression they were different from usual. An... an irrational feeling. I wouldn't be able to explain it, as soon as I've seen the two of them, I thought that Mion was Shion, and vice versa. Something inside me was going on telling it._

_It was my instinct... But I've never trusted my instinct. I have always thought that a reasoned mental process was better than an irrational decision. It has been so since that day... I knew that Great-grandpa was not a good person, but that day my instinct told me it was all fine, and I followed him to his study without being worried in the least. I was wrong, definitely... Movies and books are full of people having bad presages which turn out to be true, instead I hadn't any of them, and I was wrong. I would like so much that reality goes like the plot of books, __sometimes..._

_And so I've never believed to what my instinct said, I've always tried to reason about everything, at the cost of seeming so often absent-minded, and of reacting so slowly. When we had played with those water guns, I looked slow like a turtle, and the others laughed... they laughed at me, but that was natural. Just because my instinct said a thing, and I did another. During Mion's birthday, instead, that tiny voice had become so insisting, so strong... that I had to obey, but not before evening. And that time it was right... my prejudice against it was unmotivated.  
_

_So could I be wrong also about something else? Might I be wrong about what the way I have decided to live in? I've always thought that, as far as I took upon myself all my family's anguish, they would have spent a happy life, but that, at the same time, I wouldn't have been completely unhappy. I've never pretended to be like God, I have never desired all the world to be happy... But at least I hope to lead my relatives to a better existence. Is it so? Is this what has effectively occurred? Maybe, I will never be able to look within their hearts, to discover their true feelings... But this is a fake question._

_The bitter truth is that I can't continue along this way. I can't pretend that both my family and me live happily, that's impossible. Until now I tried to help my relatives, Dad, Grandpa... but I didn't want to become a miserable man, someone the others could do nothing but pity. The evening I had decided to take the control of my family, as much as it was possible... I thought that, if I had become too sad, the other would have looked at my condition, and they would have got depressed. I had to muster up courage. But I was asking myself something impossible. If you aren't God, you can't get rid of people's sins. Someone will always have to handle them, I should have realized it when I had declared to take my great-grandfather's place. If I take this burden, I will be sad. If I give it to my family, they will be sad. There's no third choice, it will never vanish by magic. I pretended to be like Jesus, what a conceited idiot I was...  
_

_Yes, that's it. A partial sacrifice is useless. I have to decide whether being happy or giving this happiness to someone else. What should I choose?_

_No, I have already chosen. I had taken my decision that far day, and there is no way to change it. I can't go behind, it would be an unbearable blow for my relatives, and for me as well. It would be the end of our family._

_So..._

_Why? Why have I to renounce, definitely? Rena had told me once that we would have been..._

_I don't want to make this further sacrifice. I don't want to go..._

_I am crying. I can feel the warm tears on my cheek, and their salty taste inside my mouth. I had hardly ever cried, in front of other people, maybe the last time had been the day when that man had cut my arm, and marked __my whole life. But each time I was alone I was free to unbosom myself, far from my relatives, far from Dad, far from Grandpa, far from Mom, far from Alice, and I could leave my anguish flow out of me. I had cried so many times..._

_I am too weak to be the model they'd like me to be, I am conscious of that. I can be only a lightning rod. I will never be able to have my own life, all I can do is allowing them to have theirs..._

_But..._

_But I want to... I want h..._

_Oh, my... I am scraping my throat. A tear of blood is coming down my fingernails, and I can feel the neck aching, and sample the taste of my own blood on my tongue. I can't be wrong this time, both my instinct and my mind agree, this can't be a hallucination. Wasn't this what had happened to Seohara-san? Aren't these the effects of the Syndrome? Rika-chan had told us about them, she had described all the details of the disease she knew. So I am traveling towards craziness?_

_Probably._

_Thankfully._

_I don't want to avoid it. I am deliberately accepting it. I want to sink in this ocean of madness._

_Taking the other way would be so painful... Yes, I am a weak. I am aware of it. But maybe I won't be so unhappy, in the end. This is the only way left to me to have a life without too much suffering, and the only important thing is not to kill or harm anybody. Nobody will complain about that, in this way, nobody will suffer because of me. Rika-chan had told me that people suffering from the disease desire to take the others' life... But in my case, the only one I am going to take is going to be my own one, and I am accepting it. _

_I won't commit suicide, of course, it wouldn't come in useful at all. But it will be as if I will... I am going to take what has left of my happiness, and throwing it away. It's necessary that I am not happy, so I won't be happy. Yeah, this is my choice... After all, isn't this a melody I already know?_

_This is the sound of that music box... The one that man had in his study, the one Alice had destroyed, the one harassing me during in all this time... it's so strange that before I hadn't noticed it, I can so clearly listen to it, now. These notes will go after me until my death... It's useless to resist. This cradling sound, this sweet sign of my incoming foolishness... is the link between me and great-grandpa. The evidence that I am his descendant, and that I can't do anything against this._

_Please, Sister Madness, take me wherever you want. You had been waiting for me since that far day, hadn't you? That must have been a long, boring wait, sorry if I played hard to get. But now I am here, meek and ready to follow you. Show me your way, and make me see what you have arranged for me, after all these years._


	45. Resisting to impulses

******45**** – Resisting to impulses**

_Hinamizawa, 27th February 1984_

_0.00023 mg/cm__3_

This number, underlined on the sheet of paper in front of Rika, had just become the center of her attention. The little blue-haired girl, after asking help from the villagers in order to find Giancarlo, had hastily returned to the Clinic, to know as soon as possible the results of the doctors' last exams. She had left Mion together with the other boys of their school, who were going to join Shion's group. Rika didn't want to left her alone, she looked withdrawing into a silence more and more total, fully insensible to what the others were saying to her, or to how they were cheering her up. But at the same time she couldn't wait being told what Irie had discovered, they were vital pieces of information.

She was then sat there, inside the Clinic, still breathless due to her run. Next to her, Irie, who was reading again the other sheets of those short medical records. Outside, instead, it was getting darker, a new night was beginning to enshroud the village with its long black curtain, and these were not good news, it would have been harder to get him. Rika was worried, and in that moment she couldn't either unbosom with Hanyuu, she had not a spiritual form anymore, but she was with the others, far from her, engaged with the search. She would have liked to have her next to her, but it had been a choice of her, so she couldn't complain. Therefore, the only thing she might do was speaking with Irie, and soon she decided to do it.

"Irie" she asked, in the end "What is this number? I can't understand, but it seems to be quite important."

The doctor took a pen from his desk, and with it he pointed at the number that Rika had seen, to be sure she was talking about that one. Then, he simply answered: "That's the quantity of ATPC inside the last sample of Sonozaki-san's blood."

"And... Is it a good value, or a bad one? Forgive me, Irie, but I don't know a lot about the matter."

"Well... It's a bad one, I fear. You see, it's five times higher than what we had found in all the previous analyses. It's not normal, it's not normal at all."

"So I was right, Mii-chan's indifference is not natural. Irie, do you think that this abnormality in her blood can be the cause of her behavior? Mii-chan has always been so energetic, so active... Now she seems so passive, instead."

"I can't be sure, this substance is still nearly unknown... But I don't exclude it. It's... both a consequence and a cause, depending on how you look at it. In fact I suppose that its massive presence is a reaction of her body, one of immunological genre: in this period she has to undergo a very stressful period, and normally the parasite would attack a person in her conditions... That's why her immune system is producing such a huge quantity of ATPC. We could say her body has no choice, that it has decided to wrap her in cotton wool: it may sound strange, but in this way she will suffer less than what she would do in a normal situation, because she nearly doesn't understand what exactly takes place around her, and then these side effects become the lesser evil. Namely... this ATPC is becoming something similar to morphine, inside her blood."

"Sorry, but I can't just agree with you, Irie. This is not a little side effect, that substance is changing Mii-chan's personality!"

"Are you saying she'd better clawing out her throat and die, due to the Syndrome, then?"

"Please, Irie, don't tell things in this way... I don't know what to think. Mii-chan is... like a doll, on her own, now. She doesn't react, she doesn't decide, she doesn't do anything. The only thing she's doing now is suffering without either being allowed to open her mouth and show these feelings... I am sure of it. We need her, but now..."

"We'd need to eliminate the source of her strain, but we can't do it for now, Rika-chan. We must find Serco-san, first, and once we do it you'll see how Sonozaki-san's health will improve. I'm sure that not being able to protect her friends is one of the main causes of her actual stress, and we must convince her that she can still do that."

"I see, but what about Megumi-san and Goemon-san? We can't make them disappear, and as far as this problem exists, the source of her malaise will never cease to torment her."

"It's true, unluckily. But once the other factors are solved, she will feel certainly better, and she will face even this one. It's our only chance, I hope we're going to succeed."

"I hope so, too..." concluded Rika, on the verge of desperation.

…

The day after, Hinamizawa's school stayed closed, even though it was Monday.

Most of the students couldn't find the stimuli to go there and study, and therefore the principal had exceptionally grant them a couple of days off, in order to allow them to focus on the search and their other concerns. Shion had thanked him in her sister's name, Mion was like locked inside herself, withdrawn, and she didn't say a word to anyone. Paradoxically, it was Alice's turn to console her for what had happened to her brother, despite she wanted to cry so much, wishing to hear in turn some heartening word by anyone. After transferring in the Manor after what had occurred at her home the day before, she had seen her friend's state of mind, and she had concluded that she had to be strong, for Mion and for herself. She was aware that was everything she could do for now, but it was enough.

On the other hand, Giancarlo was nowhere to be found. Which was strange, he couldn't go that far. Keiichi was a bit nervous, the traps Satoko had placed here and there clearly showed that nobody had been captured, and then his escape through the woods was an improbable event. He wasn't like Seohara, he hadn't had any time to find a way to avoid all those hidden tricks while they were pursuing him, and finally there wasn't a reason for him to go up there, at least if he didn't intend to die there... But those were not things to think about, Keiichi told himself, they had to be optimists.

Of course, most of the rest of the village had to go to work, that morning, rice doesn't grow up alone, so they had to leave the searching teams, after a long night spent looking in every corner of Hinamizawa. They would have immediately reported to the police any news, but at the moment the ones who were searching for him were mostly the officers, coordinated by Flavia. Plus Keiichi, Daijiro and Alice, who, after being at the Manor all the night, had decided to give them a hand.

But the situation was even on the point of getting worse. Scandalmongers were still around, and the rest of the Sonozaki clan was soon informed about how Mion had reacted at the unfolding of the events caused by Goemon's challenge. They were troubled and concerned, even the ones who trusted her the most wanted to control if those anguishing gossips were true, and in the afternoon they phoned to the Manor, announcing an immediate extraordinary visit, to know how their actual ruler was planning to deal with the issue. And then, the state of anxiety inside the Manor itself was predictable and understandable.

"What can we do?" asked Shion, going back and forth along her room "What can we do? Please, give me a suggestion! Onee's presence is necessary, but we can't let the other see how much she is downhearted."

"I know it doesn't enthusiasm you, but I fear that we will have to use a little trick, again..." answered Satoshi, who was there with her little sister. "Ask your sister all the particulars about what Goemon-san has told her, to be sure not to make any mistake, and then... Well, you'll replace her one more time."

"Shhh!" replied Satoko "Don't speak so loud, Nii-Nii. Akane-san or Kasai-san could enter at any time, and hear us!"

Shion didn't agree, unluckily. "No, Satoko, don't scold him. Onee had already said to Kei-chan and me all the details, so this is not the point. Instead... I guess that it will be just the same, telling them what we're going to do or not. They will be waiting for "Mion" just out of here, her room is by this. But once they see her going out of here with you two, Mom and Kasai will find out the truth immediately, they are not that stupid, and they will notice immediately the sudden change of mood. I am not a good actress, and I wouldn't be able to simulate that kind of attitude... Without forgetting that, instead, I have to look strong to the others."

"So, if you look strong and resolute, your mother will discover the truth. If you look weak, instead, your relatives will definitely leave your side. Is it so?"

"Indeed. I was sure you would understand, Satoko. I am not good enough to lie about this, finding a compromise between those two states of mood is too hard for me, and I might cause a disaster. I think we'd better only mislead the other members of our clan, after all they don't know us as Mom does, but..."

"And they are the ones we have to deceive, in fact! I understand your point of view, Nee-Nee, your mother will be puzzled by your attitude, if she notices something... But we have no choice, don't hesitate and be strong. We will confess to her what we have done, if that's the case, but we won't tell anything, for the moment. For the time being, you are going to become a determined Sonozaki Mion, in everybody's sight, and nobody will be told about your real identity. Now we must hurry up, we haven't the whole day!"

"And I even thought that I was about to never handle this kind of matters, once the leader's role had been given to Onee..." Shion sighed "Instead it's already the... fourth time that I have to wear her clothes, in the last days. But I don't want to go on feigning to be her, get that into your thick skull, this is the last time, got it?"

"Got it!" answered Satoko, who smiled and stood up, before checking that the hallway was still empty and going to take Mion's clothes, in the adjacent room. Akane and Kasai were not there yet, indeed, the meeting would have only started in no less than an hour, and she had time to get Mion's white kimono from her room without being noticed.

Satoko opened delicately the door of Mion's bedroom, and she found her inside. It wasn't unexpected, she knew that, in spite of the others' insistence, the poor unlucky girl had asked and obtained to stay alone there... But what had she to tell her, before getting the kimono? Good manners invited Satoko to speak, but the blond-haired girl was not sure about what to say. Anyways, she soon realized that all her concern was somewhat useless: her pony-tailed friend was not about to mind about her for sure, she didn't look intending to either ask her anything about her presence there. Satoko, closing back the door of the bedroom, opened the wardrobe, getting what she was looking for, and then she exited again, wordless and uneasy. Mion, sat immobile on her chair, looked to have neither noticed her, she seemed a blind and deaf girl, or even a waxwork. She didn't glance at her, she didn't move her head. Prey of her deepest anguish, she stayed still, as if her will had been completely annihilated, and her soul was far from her body.

Satoko felt pity for her, but she could do nothing for her, by now. She ground her teeth with frustration, and she quickly went back to Shion's room, paying attention not to dirty her kimono. She entered, and after leaning the dress on the desk she asked Satoshi to exit, since their friend had to get ready for the meeting.

"That's OK..." answered Satoshi "But before going out, I want to ask you something... I'd like to go with you to the meeting."

"With me? I appreciate it, really... But why? The others will never understand why a Houjou wishes to be present among the Sonozakis, and they may even have doubts about my real identity."

"I'm... I'm worried, you know. And hasn't your sister told once that I am going to be part of your clan, soon? This is what I'm going to tell them, if they ask about my presence."

"Sa-satoshi-kun!" shouted Shion, blushing, before getting back her calm "Yes, I remember that, but you are supposed to become _Shion's _partner, not _Mion's _one! It's gonna be suspicious."

"The fact you are not present doesn't mean I can't take part in it... Namely, I want to be helpful... and this is a good chance to be that. Please, try to understand."

The green-haired girl didn't find the courage to object. But at a first glance, Shion hadn't understood the reason of Satoshi's sudden change, of his obstinate stubbornness... He had never been so enterprising, he was a quiet boy who wished nothing more than a normal life, he had always been so. But finally... he was just worried about her. Shion's mind flew back to the period they had just met, when he had protected her from those thugs. He had placed himself between her and them, ordering to leave her alone, claiming to be strong and resolute... But she remembered that he was trembling, while pronouncing those brave words. He was scared, that day, those boys were older and physically much stronger than him. But her sake had become the most important thing for him in that instant, and he was ready to face everything, in order to grant it.

That day was the same. Satoshi already knew not to be able to deal with her girlfriend's relatives. They were frightening, their face were always serious and menacing, and the boy was not a good speaker like Keiichi. But he wanted to prevent everything bad from happening to her, he didn't know how to do it, but he was resolute to do it somehow. Because he desired to protect her, he intended to be next to her, in that moment and in the following ones. And he was definitely not useless: his only presence was enough to make Shion calmer, and that was a prominent result.

Shion sighed. She knew that, once her brother was about to join the others, also Satoko would have asked to do the same. And, while she was holding in her hands the kimono she was going to wear, she was fairly appreciating their gesture. She was sure that, each time the others were about to question the actions by the main branch, the Houjous would have come in her assistance. Maybe he was not able to find a good subject to retort with, but he was not going to ever leave her. He was an unbreakable wall she could always take refuge behind, the ideal partner for her. But he was not only that, Shion thought... _Batcha hated their parents, and now their sons are helping the ruler of the family, regardless about the past... They are great, Satoshi-kun is great. Sometimes... S__ometimes I think he would be the ideal partner for the ruler of the Sonozaki family..._

…

In the meanwhile, Rena was alone, at the Clinic, contemplating from the window the sky which was getting dark, because of the heavy rain clouds appeared from behind the mountains. It was probably the first time nobody was with her, but at least she could think about what had occurred, calmly.

Little by little, she was forgiving her father. Some day before, right after she had reached that cold room, he had visited her, and there he had told her all the truth. Seohara was right, he had a lover, a lot of time ago... But he had already atoned for that. It had been hard for him to recover from what had occurred in Ibaraki, and in Hinamizawa as well, due to his story with Rina. That difficult period had been is penance, and now Rena thought that it was enough, that it was a good thing to forgive him, after all. Everyone was responsible for what he had done, so her mother had decided to live with her new partner because of a choice of her, and not just because of her husband's betrayal. And at the same time, Rena wanted to go on living with her father because of a choice of her, and not because she had forgotten what he had done. Casting it up at him in perpetuity would have been helpless, and she had realized she still needed him, as well as he needed her. They both were sinners, finally, but they could still help each other in living with their past sins. That was the difference between Seohara and she, in the end. Unlike him, she could accept what the others had done, because she recognized not to be better than them. All those experiences, all those strange dreams... she had never understood completely where they came from, but they had taught her something, and now she was availing of this teaching. Hating the others, denying them... could bring only pain and sorrow, because doing that would mean not understanding what you are. Everyone has committed bad sins, nobody excluded, but these same sins can become the spur pushing people to desire to improve, to help the others to deal with their own sins, to give them a future better than how their past was. It went for her father, and it went for her.

Was that the answer she was looking for? Rena's mind was still full of doubts, she didn't know how she had to behave exactly with his father, now, and she was asking herself whether it was too early to go home, or if it was better to wait for him to apologize explicitly, and not only to her, but also to the Seoharas... There wasn't much she could do about that, maybe contacting them in Ibaraki... But it was better not make these steps in a hurry. A day she was going to talk with him about this, but time for it had still to come.

Indeed, now she was more worried about Mion, rather than about her health or her family. She was told about the fact she had been saying nothing, since her return from Kiyotsu. She had stayed sat all the evening in her bedroom, and she feared that she had done the same that day, too. How could she make her react...? It was hard to answer to such a question. Probably, the best thing to do was finding Giancarlo, and letting her see he was still fine and curable, despite the new Syndrome. But where could he be? She remembered her old dreams, she remembered that people suffering from the disease were usually obsessed about something, about a sort of insisting bee in their bonnet, and every action of them was made as a function of that insane purpose. What could be this recurring thought...

_Knock, knock._

Suddenly, Rena heard the door knocking, someone was behind it, surely to see her. Who might it be? Irie? Takano? No, they would have announced their arrival, and she would have listened to their voice. So, it was something else. Rena decided to sat on her bed, drawing herself up with the help of her arms, and then she allowed the visitor to enter the room.

The handle moved delicately, and two figures came in silently. Who were they? The girl didn't think to have ever seen them. Two middle-aged people, nearly as old as her father. A man and a woman, absolutely ordinary people, likely husband and wife. Were they there for a reason? Rena guessed so. There was something strange in them, something important, but something she didn't realize, at once.

Everything was about to get clear in a few moments, but now the man started to speak, and he only said: "Good morning, miss... Are you fine, Ryuugu-san? They told us you have a severe problem at your legs."

"I... Rena is fine, after all. I have had worse days than this, please don't be concerned about my health. But may I ask you who are you?"

"Yes, of course, we have been impolite... My name is Seohara Kuzo, and she's my wife, Yoko. We are... we were the parents of who had reduced you to such a condition."

Rena winced. Yes, now she had realized why they were drawing her attention in that way. She was under the impression that she had already seen those faces, and it was due to the fact that man's look was incredibly similar to Seohara's one. _And so, the one next to him is her father's old lover... _A feeling of instinctive ungovernable anger rose from the girl's soul. She was the original sinner in all this story, together with her father she was the one who had caused all that trouble and pain to so many people...

The woman noticed that Rena was insistently staring at her with a not benevolent look, and so she lowered her head, uneasy. But at the same time, the brown-haired girl comprehended she hadn't to be furious towards her, and that this feeling was cruel towards her. She began to think to be a hypocrite, some second earlier she had made all those nice reflections about forgiveness... But, as well as Rena's father, Seohara Yoko had certainly suffered a lot because of her fault, she could see it by the way the woman was looking at her, and at her husband too. A veil of persistent sadness filled those small gray eyes, and anxiety and sorrow had made her face get very old, she was not the beautiful woman she once was used to be in those past days.

Rena couldn't know that, but she was living the same kind of experience Keiichi had faced when he had met the little girl he had shot in one of her eyes, some time before. A piece of her past was in the same room where she was, and she couldn't run away from it. Furthermore, her state of losing was heightened by the fact this visit had not been arranged by her, but it was absolutely not planned. But, recovering from those feelings, she guessed to have been mean and rude with that woman, and she immediately turned her eyes elsewhere. But the man next to them intervened, to solve the raising embarrass he was feeling in turn: "Don't worry, Ryuugu-san, I know everything about the past, my wife has told me. And I know about all the rest, the facts in Ibaraki, the ones here..."

"I... I see..." Rena just answered.

"And I'm here to apologize."

Rena was not looking at them, when she heard him saying that last phrase. She wished to avoid his wife's eyes, and moreover she was expecting such a sentence. After all, they were there to visit her, and good manners required that declaration. It was not a surprise, she softly muttered to herself...

But she changed her mind, when she heard a not defined noise, and she finally turned at them. Both of the man and the woman had bowed down to her, and they didn't dare gazing at her. Their was not a courtesy call, they were sincerely regretful.

"Seohara-san" said then Rena, realizing that they had begun to cry "You don't have to..."

"No, I must do this. You know, in Ibaraki I was so scared, I was a coward. I had to understand his brother was covering up what he had done. It was not like Koji to attack you down there in Ibaraki, he had always been quite a calm boy. Surely calmer than his younger brother. I think... that he only hoped him to learn his lesson, and to become a better person, but..." He stood up slowly, wiping away his tears with the sleeve of his coat, and he approached the wall. Then, he closed the window of the room. He did so because he guessed to do a favor to Rena, the shutters were just ajar and a cold breeze was starting to enter. The girl on the bed nodded smiling as sign of appraisal, and then he added, sadly "But my greatest fault dates back to the last period, Ryuugu-san... I had to understand he was not normal anymore... He was obsessed, I could see his behavior at home, and I had to report it to the doctors who were trying to cure him. But I feared to be wrong, I feared to ruin him completely, if I had taken the wrong choice. And moreover, I was scared by our neighbors' rumors, They were becoming more important than my own son's health. They already knew he had to go to a psychologist, if something else had happened they would have told our family was made only of scoundrels..."

"Now please stop... You shouldn't blame yourself to this extent..."

"No, I must. I had to keep a watch on him, but I didn't... He was a bad boy, now I know it, and it's only our fault."

"No, I'm not sure it is." Rena was getting sorry for their cursed son. She was aware of his schizophrenia, and she was aware also that she had been the cause of it. When they had tried to rape her in Ibaraki, she had hit him with a baseball bat, and all the news she was told in the course of time had made her conclude that that blow had damaged his brain irreversibly. Finally, he hadn't been given the same change she had got. While she was alone, she had chosen to forgive her father for what he had done, but Seohara couldn't do that, that choice had been denied to him. His state of schizophrenia forbade him to reason peacefully, and so he had been condemned to hate her forever, with no chance to change.

But the man's following words surprised her: "No, it is, instead. As we have told you before, he has never been a good and polite kid. Even when he was very young, even when he was healthy, he loved teasing the others, making all sorts of jokes, including bad and dangerous ones. If he had tried to take revenge on you in that way, that day, that was because his true self was not kind, on the contrary... His illness had not created a non-existent side of him, it had awaken one which was already present inside him. That's why I'm saying we must blame only ourselves, we have failed as educators, and this is the truth."

"I... understand..." Rena realized that they were extremely sorry, for what they thought to have done. She wanted them not to get depressed by what had happened to their son, and she wished to give them a hand... But at the same time they were teaching them something incredibly important. She had learned from her mistakes, from her sins... But she could do the same even from the others' ones. By telling her their story, they were showing her the importance of keeping a strong relationship with her relative. The Seoharas had committed something wrong in the past, both the parents and the sons, and they had not been able to remedy, because they didn't pay attention to what the other members of their family were feeling. She was still able to prevent the same from taking place between her father and her. She was aware that both of them had done something bad, and that having doubts is not necessarily a bad thing, but leaving him alone any more time was the worst choice she could ever take. She had a tangible example in front of her, she could see where that chance could bring to. And she could avoid it, at least for her and her beloved parent.

That was the key she needed, definitely. Slowly, talking with those melancholic people, Rena was conscious she was making peace with her past in Ibaraki, or at least with a part of it. Her mother would have never wished to have any relationship with her, after she had decided to live with her father. But she could still build a pleasant relation with the other people she had dealt with in that period. Maybe one day also the other boys' parents would have come, and she would have been glad to talk with them too, to heal the mutual wounds. Thankfully, that sad event in Ibaraki was now a closed chapter of her life.

Learning from the others' experience... Could it be a worthy reasoning for Mion, too? Rena hoped so. They could think back to some past stories, they could learn from the others' old decisions and strategies. Who could do that analysis? Satoko had a sharp mind, and she loved to think about new possible tricks. Keiichi was not stupid at all, and he would have helped his friends with everything he had got. Rika knew a lot about Hinamizawa's past, and there had surely been other situations similar to hers. And Giancarlo could give a hand too, once they had been able to save him.

Rena smiled, looking at the first drops of rain falling down from the sky. In the end they all would have helped Mion, they all cared about her. On the other hand, even in the period when Alice wanted her to get engaged with her brother, she had refused politely, because she had understood that she wasn't his ideal partner. Alice was so disappointed, but she had understood. Finally, Rena was sure to be right, since rather...

_Rather..._

_The bee in his bonnet..._

_Oh my..._

Rena got suddenly in a cold sweat, and the Seoharas quickly noticed it.

"Ryuugu-san, what's wrong?"

"I..." she whispered "I thought we had more time, but..." She tried to go up, but obviously she couldn't, and then she nervously pressed several times a button next to her bed, in order to call Irie-sensei.

"Ryuugu-san, please tell us, what's wrong?" repeated Seohara Kuzo.

"We... We haven't any time to lose... Mii-chan is in danger..."

* * *

**Author's note: Please, tell me if you're enjoying this story, I'd really like to read your opinions about it, if there are doubts, things too complicated/hard to understand, and so on.**


	46. When moths cry

******46**** – When moths cry**

_Hinamizawa, 27th February 1984_

The sky was now completely dark, and the rain was getting heavier and heavier. An impetuous wind lashed at the trees and at the walls of the Manor, so strong to look able to sweep all of them away. The signs of the imminent thunderstorm had terrified the few birds which still dared to fly over the zone and challenge the icy weather, forcing them to take refuge within the first shelter they could find. The noise caused by the drops falling on the roof was becoming loud, nearly irritating and insufferable, and in that situation everyone would have been instinctively pushed to turn his own head, and look out of the window. And this is what Mion slowly did, too.

In spite of what the others were afraid of, she wasn't in a vegetative state yet, sometimes she still reacted to an external spur, but only if it didn't come from a human voice or act. She had already suffered a lot because of people, now it was like she wanted to avoid contacts with them as much as it was possible for her. Even if they didn't want to harm her, even if they were kind and attentive towards her, they ended up causing her new pain, willingly or not. Satoshi, Kimiyoshi, Keiichi, Nabiha, Rena, Megumi and her husband, Giancarlo... In her mind she was continuously reeling off the elements of that list, as if they were stations of her own Way of the Cross. Because of all of them, her last months had been the worst of her life, in spite of the fact that most of them didn't intend to be the cause of this sorrow, and being conscious of that was making her even more disappointed. Her club, to her, had represented the source of all her hopes, of all the joyful and marvelous experience she thought to be about to live. And instead, the greatest frustrations she had to undergo were coming from the Club itself, from its members in particular.

That rain, instead, was pleasant and welcome, something which would have never harmed her. When weather is like that, people go out less often, they have to take an umbrella which often covers their face, or they prefer even to stay at home. And then the solitude she was aiming at was easier to obtain. It was nearer, even because Shion, Satoshi and Satoko were still there at the meeting her family had settled. But, unfortunately, they had been at the dojo for a while, probably they were going to finish the encounter and go back up soon.

Mion didn't want to talk with them another time. She wasn't feeling like do it, she'd rather stay alone for the moment, there in her bedroom or elsewhere. But where could she go, to avoid them? She couldn't walk along the corridors of the Manor. When Satoko had come and taken her clothes, she had understood what Shion was planning to do, certainly it was not news, to her. But then, if the others had seen another _Mion_ walking out of the room where the first one was speaking, it would have been a real disaster, and her sister would have had to tell some good explanations and excuses. That was not a good idea, and on the other hand it was about to took too much time, to comb her hair like Shion's one, so that chance had to be discarded, too.

Nevertheless, there was a place where she could get the peace she was looking for. Mion stood up, and she reached the sliding door of her bedroom which overlooked the outside. It was raining, but a good umbrella would have suited her. She would have used it only for a couple of minutes, while walking from the main building of the Manor to the cave where the torture room was. She had the key of the entrance, actually she was still the leader of the clan, so there weren't particular problems. From the dojo or the other rooms of the Manor, nobody would have seen her going out through that door.

And everything went as she wished. She didn't want the others to seek her because of any concern, so in her room she had left a short note on which she had written _I'll be at home before dinner, don't worry._ Then, while opening the heavy door which usually locked the cave, she was sure that nobody would have disturbed her.

She closed the door back, without locking it, nobody would have come there. After all, that was not a place where people could spend time pleasantly, especially the ones whose morale was already down. The shortage of light, inside there, gave to the whole environment a sinister look, and there were only a few pillows where she could sit on. But she didn't want to use them, the last day they had had used had been the one when Shion had to rip three of her fingernails, they didn't remind joyful memories. The tool they had used that day was still there, like many others, leaned on one of the tables of the main hall of the cave. She desired not to give a look at it, either by chance, so she decided to go to one of the adjacent rooms, to look for a chair and to wait an hour or two, to make sure all the guests went away before her coming back.

There, it was cold. Mion hadn't stripped off the jacket she had worn before leaving her room, but the very low temperature inside the cave was however beginning to make her teeth chatter. Thankfully, next to the girl there was a brazier, usually used to brighten the room and warm it. She immediately lighted it on with a match, and then she sat on the old wooden chair she had found. Now it was slightly better, she could feel the weak heat coming from that fire, and hearing it cheerfully crackling was relaxing. In this way that waiting would have been less boring and suffering...

_Creeek._

Mion started, hearing that noise. The door had moved, she could recognize that sound among thousands of others. Was it the wind? Hardly, it was true that she hadn't locked the gate, but it was an old iron one, very heavy. So, someone had followed her, pushing in turn the door. But who might it be? Any of her friends would have called her, after entering. And the other members of her family would have done the same. _Onee, Mii-chan, Mion-san, Sonozaki-sama..._ In each case, she would have listened to at least one of these expressions, which would have made her realize even who the other was.

Instead, she was enshrouded by silence. It was an intruder, likely. But who? In order to reach the cave they had to go through the main door of the Manor, which was guarded by Kasai. In that moment there was an official meeting of the clan, and the main branch had to take care of security, so there was no chance that her bodyguard had left his position, next to the entrance door.

Was somebody hiding, within the cave? It didn't look so. Mion closed her eyes, stopping even to breath in order to hear the softest sound. And from there, she could perceive steps coming from the zone where the door was. His shoes were trampling on the stone the floor was made of, and in that closed cave the sounds produced rumbled, making them easily noticeable. So, the intruder didn't mind concealing his presence to her. He surely had seen her opening the door, otherwise he would have found it locked, and he couldn't enter, so he knew she was inside. Therefore... was he looking for her? Maybe was it Megumi's bodyguard, come there to harm her? No, their plan was to let the others see how incapable she was in this kind of situation, killing her would have allowed her not to face the issue, and it would have paradoxically saved her from a bad situation.

So, what was the identity of that unknown? She hadn't closed the door which separated the main hall from the room she was in, then she could glimpse at what was in the main hall itself. But, if in a normal bright environment she would have been able to see him from a decent distance, in this case she had to wait for him to come next to her. The brazier illuminated only the zone very next to her, it wasn't strong enough to give light to the whole cave, most of which was still covered with an absolute darkness. And instead, the intruder had probably seen her, thanks to the brazier, and he was walking towards her. Yes, she had to wait, the other was not definitely planning to catch her by surprise... Those slow steps were getting louder and louder, he was on the verge of reaching her.

He was no more than five meters far from her...

He stopped, and Mion looked at his face.

And she turned pale.

"G-G-Gi-chan..." she whispered.

"I had heard you weren't speaking anymore. So you are finer than what they think, in the end." This was his answer. Somehow he had informed himself about her state of health, then... In the last hours Mion didn't want to speak, indeed, but it was because she didn't know what had happened to him, exactly like the others. Since the one who could be defined as the cause of her malaise was in front of her, now, she had begun to say some word again, even if she was still uneasy.

On the other hand, instead, he didn't look fine at all. His neck covered by blood and scrapes was not unpredicted, every person suffering from the Syndrome showed those symptoms. But that was not all. Despite the cold weather, the right sleeve of his sweater and the one of the shirt under it had been torn apart, and Mion could see again the scars he had let her see the other day. But his arm was not marked only by them, now. The signs of one, two, a thousand bites were covering it, and red lines of blood started from his shoulder and ended next to his wrist, due to the fact that one or two of his old wounds had been reopened. Did he want to rip his arm in that manner? Maybe, but there were dozens of ways better than that. Or maybe those bites were only a sign of hatred towards those scars. He didn't intend to cut his arm off, but it was a sign of his despise towards it, and towards himself. Or maybe, more simply, he acted recklessly, without thinking. Logic doesn't work very much, with who is affected with the disease. Satoshi, when he had attacked them, was in a similar condition.

But the particular which scared Mion the most were his eyes, once he reached the torch which enlightened his face. Black, completely black. Their white scleras had vanished, as well as their irises, absorbed by their pupils which had expanded to the point of englobing the other parts of his eye. That enlargement was theoretically impossible, but it had just happened... And moreover his pupils seemed so unnatural. Both of them were like broken, plowed by lots of even darker lines, like a mirror broken to pieces by a fist, or anything else. And like a mirror which can't be repaired, the effects of the Syndrome were making him resembling to someone they couldn't help anymore, someone completely sunk into the deepest madness. His behavior would have been influenced neither by the explicit weakness of Mion's look.

He was acting coldly, in fact. He had just said he knew about his friend's situation, but he didn't ask her how she was, nor he had hinted a word of relief. Why was he there, in the end? Mion thought that too, and he asked it to him.

Hearing that question, he started walking, and in a second he reached her. His black eyes were staring at her, mute, as if he wasn't sure about what to do. Then: "I was here to ask you only a thing, Mii-chan. I wanted to ask you that, before I came here. But..."

He was too calm, considering the actual level of the disease inside him. Frightening motionless.

"But then, I changed my mind, I realized it was useless. Do you want to know what I wished to tell you?" He paused "I desired... to date you. I wanted you to be my girlfriend."

Nobody spoke for a while. They could hear only the crackling of the fire in the brazier, and the sound of the drops of rain which filtered through the stone and fell to the floor, like a natural clock which was beating time. Mion didn't want to comment what she had just heard, she was just looking to the ground, and Giancarlo sounded wavering about continuing his speech. It took a lot of time, for him, to finally go on, grinning: "You know, suffering from this Syndrome is like being drunken... You stop lying, and you are not afraid to cause sorrow to the others, and so you feel free to reveal the most secret feelings which you are hiding within your heart... You have just heard mines, haven't you? But strangely I already knew it was useless. I am nothing special for you, am I not? You dislike people like me, you'd rather go with strong guys, with boys capable and self-confident. I understand this, I don't blame you for this..."

Suddenly, with a dart he grabbed one of her arms, and with a choked voice he said: "But... I still want to live with you, I don't want to renounce to you. It would be too painful, I am tired to do this kind of sacrifices. I know that a real relationship would be impossible, for a thousand reasons, but I can't accept my fate, not this time. I don't want to, I don't want to..."

He grabbed her other arm, while a tear fell from his eye: "Please, don't ask me to leave you, I don't want, I don't want. I want... I want you."

Mion finally reacted. She raised her head, and she whispered: "So these were your real feelings... And you are behaving so because of the disease..." She paused, and then she added a single word: "No..."

Those few letters were like a mortal stab to him. He concluded to have been just rejected. New cracks appeared in his eyes. And then he moaned softly, staggering, and he replied: "I knew that... You don't want me... But... But... It's too hard to..." He grabbed her arms more strictly, and he made her fall to the ground.

…

_Please, Mion, try to understand... I have already suffered enough, in my life. My birth, and my arm cut because of my great-grandfather's foolishness. And then my forced investiture as chief and most important member of my family... I didn't want to do that, but I had no choice. I am not good at being a leader, I am not good at all. I am not a communicative person, I hate talking to people, I hate telling them to do something. I am the least fitting boy to such a role... All I can do is reading my books and being an introvert man._

_I am not like you. When you had to deal with Rika's strange behavior, only a few time after our arrival in Hinamizawa, and when you had organized with Keiichi that protest march to the prefecture... You did it with care and application, but always with a smile on your face. I could see you were happy to fill that role, you wanted really to do that. And I could admire you how you were able to involve the others too, all of you were part of a unique group, like what Hinamizawa's spirit had always incited to do. And even in the darkest moments, when you were sad, you hadn't stopped to coordinate the search for Rena, and your fight against Megumi... You, and your all friends, are marvelous people, and living with you was a great honor. After all, Alice had realized that immediately, she had been able to join you perfectly, on the contrary of me. I could learn so much from you, but I didn't... My nature was stronger than my will. Forgive me, for this._

_That's why I've always thought to be different from the others, and not in a positive way... Keresana-san, once, had asked me what we were, and I had answered that you were cicadas, and I was a moth. Cicadas always look for their own fellows, letting out their noise... A moth instead, lives alone. And it dies alone, with no chance to have another destiny. This was what I thought about it that day, and about me, as well._

_But slowly... I had rebelled against that unavoidable fate. I believed that if I had a strong and joyful person as girlfriend, I would have been a better boy, and everyone would have been happier. You were so different from me... You were so better than me. I had to spend as much time as possible with you, in order to improve my behavior, and to strengthen my spirit. And when I got aware that I could give a hand to you in turn, at the leisure center in Okinomiya... I was happy, really. I was glad to give you the chance to smile, I thought that my life could have a sense, in the end. Staying with you was pleasant, so pleasant, and then, little by little... I began to love you. Your doll, the one you had broken, the one I had made them repair... It was not a present by a simple friend, at least I've never seen it in this way. I wonder if you had ever noticed it..._

_If only I think about the first days, I had not a good image of you, I was sure you were mostly an aggressive and boring tomboy... But when I had seen you crying, after what Rika had told you at school, I had to recognize I was wrong. Like in tons of other times. I had understood that the fact you were different from me wasn't a problem, on the contrary it could become the best thing ever happened to me. Staying with you would have made me a better person. That's why I began to love you, you were everything I was not, you were the Sun, I was the Moon, and I hoped we could complete each other..._

_But would you have ever felt anything special, towards me? I feared you wouldn't. What might I give you, in addition to a moment of company, and a basic help that anyone else could give to you? I couldn't answer to this fundamental question._

_That's why I will never be your boyfriend..._

_But still..._

_I can't accept this..._

_I can't..._

…

_WAKE UP, GIANCARLO!_

…

Giancarlo opened his eyes wide, as awakening from a dream. A voice had called for him...

Where might it come from? It wasn't Mion's one, and there was nobody else, inside the cave. But it had been enough to make him recover momentarily his lucidity. He realized to be lying down, and he looked around to understand what was happening, before realizing with his body that there was something soft and warm under him. He looked down, and he immediately stood up by shock and terror.

Mion was there. Her coat, and her shirt too, were completely ripped, as cut to pieces by his something... It was him who had done it, there were rags of cloth, under his fingernails. Even her bra were not in its place, and from there he could see her naked breast. All her chest was covered by a transparent liquid, by his spit... His desires had made him do a horrible thing, and even if he was completely dressed and her jeans were still in their place, sign that he hadn't tried to use violence on her, he anyways though to have committed the worst of all the sins.

"What... have... I... d..." Mion didn't answer. She wasn't looking at him, she was keeping her eyes closed, and sobbing, and crying. She hadn't defended herself... And he didn't knew the reason for it. Even though she was a woman, physically she was much stronger than him, she had proven it in more than one circumstance. Why had she stayed immobile, instead? Would have she allowed him even to... to rape her?

Giancarlo went far from her, horrified for what he had risked to do. He couldn't forgive himself for that sacrilege... And his state of panic increased even further, when he heard steps coming fast from the door. The others were surely looking for Mion, and once they had seen the gate of the cave open, they had understood where they had to search for.

Instinctively, he decided he had to run. But where? That cave seemed huge, maybe in the direction opposite to the main entrance there was another exit... He started to run.

But he halted immediately. He couldn't leave Mion in that conditions, half-naked, without a shirt in that cold environment... He took off his sweater, to give it to the girl. But its sleeve was not there anymore, he had ripped it the day before... That observation made him feel even worse, it made him think to have become a beastly monster.

But he couldn't do otherwise, Mion was still there, lying down on the cold stone, motionless like a lifeless sobbing mannequin. He helped her to stand up, pulling up her back and making her at least sat on her legs, and then he made her wear his sweater.

And all, while crying in turn and caressing her to try to make her feel better, and while endlessly repeating "I'm sorry... I'm sorry... I'm sorry..." He was damned, he was cursed, but he didn't want the others to follow his same fate.

Therefore, he finished helping her, and then, just a moment before the others' arrival, he kissed her on her forehead, and he ran away down the gorge, along the steep flight of steps.

The escape inside that dark and narrow path was full of anguish, for him. He was feeling so different from how he was when he entered the Manor, hidden inside the hood of one of the guests' cars... It had been sufficient to make them stop during their trip with a bunch of nails, and to take advantage of the situation to sneak into it. He was waiting for a chance to enter the giant building, and those people seemed a good one, even if he didn't know either who they were.

Now, instead, everyone knew he was there, his sweater was easily recognizable. What would they have planned to do, once they had got him? He didn't know, but his heart was full of anguish, and he didn't care about his future punishment. Even, they could become his chance to redeem himself, in that case...

He reached the exit, in the end. Outside, a violent thunderstorm was already scourging the wood around him, but he hadn't time to think about that. Avoiding isolated trees would have protected him from any lightning, but not from the heavy rain. So, he looked for the first repair he could see, and he entered into another cave. A very little one, this time, he reached its bottom in a few steps. And when he was there, he sat on the ground, and he began to cry desperately, hiding his head under his arms and his legs.

"_Gi-chan." _

Who was it, this time? How had been able to find him so quickly? Or maybe some time had passed, since he went into that cave, and he hadn't noticed it. He was feeling terribly confused, he couldn't either say whether he had just sat there or had been there for an eternity.

But he could always see who was calling him. He lifted his head, and he observed the entrance, being nearly dazzled by the light of a bolt and deafened by the boom of the thunder.

And there, plunged into that temporary white sky, there was the figure of a little girl.

"Rika-chan..."

"Gi-chan, what's happened?" She stepped inside the cave.

"DON'T MOVE! STAY FAR FROM ME!" he yelled, leaning on the wall of the cave and trembling "I... I am a monster..."

"If you asked me to stay outside under this rain, yes, you'd be so." she replied "I have neither an umbrella, as you can see. I ran directly here, making no detours." She made another step, and she was definitely inside.

"How could you know I was here?" he asked.

"Rena-chan had told us you were probably around the Manor, and when I arrived here I've seen Shii-chan looking for her sister. I already know about that cave, I have already been there. And I know about both of its entrances... You had used the secondary one, and this is the nearest repair you could ever find. You couldn't go that far, in those conditions."

"In my conditions... Yes, you're right..."

"Your sister was so worried, you know. Where had you hidden yourself?"

"Has it any importance?"

"Yes... A situation like this could always take place again." With those questions, she was trying to calm him down, she knew what the Syndrome can do even to the most pacific people.

"I understand..." he answered in a thready voice "Well... You know, Rena-chan was there, in the clinic, and she couldn't move, so I had thought she wouldn't mind, if I borrowed her hideout..."

"Were you at the pit?" Rika exclaimed, sincerely surprised "I would have never thought about that, it was the place where usually were Rena spent a lot of time... not the one where you did."

"Nobody would have looked for me, there." he continued, prey of the saddest depression "Rena-chan is forced to stay on a bed, and the others don't know the pit very well... There is even a van, there, a place where you can stay for hours and sleeping without being disturbed..."

"I see..."

They stopped speaking, disappointed. None of them wanted that scenario to occur, but they hadn't be able to avoid it. And now, they were defenseless, in front of their destiny. Rika had hoped that the villagers' sins had been washed away from Hinamizawa, after the fight against Takano, but it was false. And now they were all paying the consequences for it.

"Rik... No, _Furude-san_" he suddenly asked, changing the name on purpose, as to say he was not worthy of being their friend anymore "What do you think I am, now?"

"You should ask yourself for it, I can't answer to this."

A thunder stronger than usual hit the ground.

"I... I don't know... You know, when I was alone I reflected, I did nothing but reflecting... And I had concluded that I couldn't be happy. That I had to sacrifice myself, to allow the others to have a normal life. Otherwise every thing I had done until now would have turned out to be useless."

"Don't say that!" shouted Rika "I don't want to hear about _sacrifices_!"

"And why?" he replied, not comprehending the reason of that reaction "In the end, it would have been better... I am weak, exactly like Grandpa, and Dad... I don't deserve a life." he swallowed "That was what I thought."

He turned to his right, seeing a spider going up the wall: "But a part of me didn't accept this decision, it didn't accept that I had chosen to have a sad and miserable existence, to go home and be the scapegoat for all my family... I wanted... I wanted to..."

"I know what you desired. You don't have to repeat it, if you wish, I understand it's painful."

"T-thank you... I had accepted a life without joy, and I could say I had even accepted to live in craziness to bear with it, till the day of my death. But I couldn't foresee that my madness would have led me to harm Mii-chan... This was..." he restarted to cry "This was the thing I wanted the least! I wanted the others to be happy, my family, your village, Nee-chan, Mii-chan... By getting rid of me, they would have been able to..."

"Can't you realize how senseless is this?" Rika yelled, because of anger and frustration "All the people you are talking about need you. We all need all the help we can have, this is something which is always true, in every period of our lives, happy and unhappy... And now are you saying we were about to feel better without you? What will your family do, once you are no more with them?"

"I... I... I..." he couldn't find an answer, he was conscious Rika was right. But soon he said: "It's too late, however. I... I know the Syndrome is killing me, the signs I had on my neck had made me understand what they had injected in my body, but anyways I can't be saved, in spite of this awareness. I have committed an irreparable sin, I can't live with you as if nothing has occurred..."

He let out a strange moan, as if his throat was obstructed by something. What was happening? From there, Rika couldn't see clearly the bottom of the cave, even because of the dark sky there wasn't light enough. But a fatal presage was alarming her like never before.

He had sunk two of his fingernails deep into his throat, carving his own flesh.

"I..." he cried "I want to die, I'd better to die. My whole life have caused pain and sorrow to so many people, and now I can't redress my sins anymore. I want to..."

He made his nails go down through his throat, feeling an agonizing pain. But he was happy to perceive it. He raised then his head, as to greet Rika a last time... But she was not next to the entrance anymore. Rather, she was now next to him, like a ghostly figure which didn't intend to leave him. _How has she been able to be that fast... What does she want to..._

He hadn't any time to ask her. He felt a little pain coming from his arm, like a sting by an insect. And a second later he collapsed down to the floor, fainted.

Rika was holding an empty syringe, and she was contemplating the upsetting show in front of her. "It can sound absurd, but you have been lucky... I had carried this with me since yesterday evening, when Mii-chan had told me what had happened to you. It's not like the one I wanted to give to Rena that night, at the pit. This sedative won't kill you, on the contrary it might save your life..." she took her handkerchief, and she knotted it all around his neck, to prevent his blood from flowing out of it. Then, she turned her head back to the entrance, realizing that the thunderstorm had just finished, and she concluded saying "At least I hope so."

She had to bring him to the Clinic, however. Fortunately, other people were not far from him. Reading what was happening before anyone else, she had run through the same passage that Giancarlo had followed, and she had reached him. But even Kasai and the others had surely concluded he couldn't escape but through that way, and so they had to be not far from the secondary exit, which meant they were not far from there. They would have helped her to carry his body, they had to save him, they had to heal his wounds on his throat, avoiding that he could bleed to death, so she went quickly back to the entrance.

Thankfully, she was right. Rika saw at once the group of searchers, and she waved her hand to make herself be seen. And, while they were approaching her, she turned at his unlucky friend, and she whispered: "I hadn't been able to rescue Rena before she was harmed in that way, but really hope I can save at least you, Gi-chan... Hanyuu still likes claiming to be a useless God, but I don't want to be a useless friend."


	47. Collapse

******47**** - Collapse**

_Hinamizawa, 28th February 1984_

_...  
_

HEART RATE: 68 bpm

_..._

Immobile, Alice was looking the cardiogram on the device alongside of the bed where his brother was resting. The repetitive bleeps produced by that machine were hammering her eardrums, and due to what she was seeing she had difficulty even in breathing.

"Sixty-eight beats per minutes... Isn't it a too low number, Takano-san?"

The nurse, who was next to her, gravely nodded: "You are right, probably it's due to the drug Rika-chan had injected in him. I don't know which substance Irie-sensei had given to her, so I can't be sure. You should go and ask him."

"This is not a cheering answer, but I fear you're right... Then I guess there is nothing you can do to improve that number, at the moment."

"If I did something without knowing all the details I'd risk only to harm him more..." Takano observed the patient, sad, before arranging his pillow and adding: "_As usual..._"

That melancholic attitude depressed Alice further on. But she knew also that she wasn't the only one in a difficult situation. In the adjacent room, Mion was resting too. They had found her inside that cold cave, sobbing, but after some second she wasn't crying anymore. She stopped crying, she stopped moving, she stopped speaking. Like a toy whose batteries had given out. She was a statue, Kasai had to shoulder her to their car, in order to drive her to the Clinic. They hadn't tried to reanimate her, because, even though they hadn't made any tests on her yet, they were quite sure about the cause of that state: the level of ATPC was likely huge, in her blood. That substance was saving her from the disease, but at the same time it was paralyzing her. And they were even afraid of healing her... for her, the only alternative to that situation was dying of the Syndrome, she wouldn't have withstood such a strain without the ATPC.

At least, now, she was sleeping, and Shion, Rika and Keiichi were looking after her. Her sister was panicky, and to calm herself down she began to talk, without ever pausing. She went on asking: "Why... Why has Onee this damn substance I haven't? What's the sense of it? We are identical twins, we should share everything! And instead... Why..." She was keeping on with that question, looking for an answer she couldn't find alone.

"Irie had told me it was only in Mii-chan's blood and in her Granny's one..." said then Rika, pronouncing the first words came in her mind, just to prevent her from continuing. "But he doesn't know its origin, actually. He's engaged about studying it, and finding a cure for its bad effects..."

"Mion's and Batcha's blood... So we can exclude hereditary factors" replied Keiichi, gazing at Shion "Otherwise your mother and you would carry it as well. You're all females, so gender has not a role, on the contrary of what happens about haemophilia, for example. So... What could it be? Maybe it's due to the fact they both were leaders of the Sonozaki clan."

"And?" asked Shion, nervously.

"And... maybe the cause is something related to their investiture. Maybe the tattoo they paint on their back is made with a traditional treatment, and they use special herbs which stimulate their organism, and..."

"No, it can't be. Mom carries the tattoo too, in the past she was the designated heiress of the family, before she got married with Dad. And there is no ATPC inside her blood."

"So it may be the rite she had to perform before become their effective ruler... When she had to sleep in that little refuge the whole night, perhaps she had to do something special, did they tell you..." he mumbled for a second or two, but then he scratched his own head "No, I am wrong another time, she had gone up there _after_ that Satoshi-kun had attacked us, and that day she had the one who healed him, which means she was already carrying the protein. Nah, the truth is that ours are only conjectures, without more info we can do nothing..."

But Rika disagreed, even if she only whispered it to herself, being careful not to be heard by the others. Keiichi's theories had made her reflect: _Maybe he's right, when he says that their role has a part in this story, but not in the sense he's talking about... If the origin of the Syndrome is Ouka, as she had affirmed at the Saiguden, it wouldn't be strange if she was the cause of the ATPC, too... _

Rika took up fumbling with her finger. _That day, she had told us to have created only the Syndrome... But surely she had quickly realized how destructive the parasites could become, she must have seen case where people were driven to craziness, due to it... She had to deal with those characters it had "autonomously developed". And so... She had already guaranteed to our family a very important role, since until now we helped people not to be the victims of the disease, but she had to think about a remedy, in case someone else was going to be suffering from the Syndrome in the future, and it looked natural to use another of the Three Great Families... _

She shook her head, the last part of her hypothesis didn't convince her. _No, it's not so, otherwise probably would have known something about it. Giving a cure and afterwards keeping it hidden to everybody is mindless, and a lot of people had died of it, especially during World War II, so she hadn't created it to heal her fellow citizens. More likely, she only wanted to protect the village by giving to the rulers of the leading families the means to survive to madness and the other symptoms of the disease, and to do that one way was as good as another. Their chiefs were the most important people in Hinamizawa, and once they were safe, everything was fine, from Ouka's point of view..._

She raised her eyes, looking at the ceiling. _It could be so. In the past, as far as I know, none of her ancestors had suffered from similar signs, but there is a reason for it... In the past, life in Hinamizawa was quiet and peaceful, nobody questioned the Sonozakis' authority, and so the strain they had to face was by far lesser than Mii-chan's one. But so, in reality the ATPC might be also the true name... the true nature of the "Demon" the Sonozaki family claims to forward from soul to soul to their descendants. And the tattoo painted on the rulers' back is just a way to show who carries it, to mark the one who has that substance, and therefore the Demon. Probably Ouka had said something about it to their leader in that time, and so that old tradition had started._

Rika lowered back her face, and she closed her eyes. She had begun to pant slightly._Yes, definitely, when Ouka had created the Syndrome, she hadn't thought about only her family... This kind of immunity I've always had goes not only for the Furudes' ruler, but also for the Sonozakis' one... I wonder if it goes even for the Kimiyoshis' one. We had never tried, during the past worlds... But Hanyuu had told me once that Ouka and she had never had a good relationship with them, when they were alive, so her daughter might have excluded them from this protection.  
_

___But... It's a real pity that this story is helpless, for us. It doesn't show us a way to find a cure, which is the only thing which matters to us..._

But a squeak awoke Rika from her numbness. Irie had just exited from his office, where he was analyzing the results of the tests he had put Giancarlo through. Since Takano was still unable to help him effectively and no other doctor knew anything about the Syndrome, he could take care of only a person at a time, and he had been compelled to choose between the too young. In the end, he had decided to go for the boy first, but only because he had already an idea about Mion's state of health, and he had thought that she had just to rest, for the moment.

But now he was with a face like thunder, and the whole group immediately approached him, hearing him come out of his study and getting in turn worried when they saw his mood. Alice, clearly, looked the most anguished one: "Sensei, so... How is he?"

"Let's take all a seat, we will talk about it calmly."

That sentence was not a good sign. If he was fine, Irie would tell it at once, to make them sigh with relief. But they anyhow obeyed, and once reached the little lecture hall of the Clinic, Irie put his sheets of table on the table, and he explained: "When you brought him here with Mion-san, he was in a drug induced coma, because of the contents of the syringe Rika-chan had administered to him. So... I thought I could heal it with a blood transfusion, like what had occurred in Satoshi-kun's case. Disturbs caused by ATPC seem to involve only the original carrier, not the people you subsequently give it to. So, even if he was not suffering from the traditional Syndrome, it was surely worth a try, if the blood types matched."

"Unfortunately, they don't. Mii-chan's blood type is B+, right? Nii-chan's one is 0+, instead..."

"Indeed... But this is not the main problem, now." Irie cleaned his glasses with a little cloth he was keeping in his small pocket, then he continued: "This morning I made deep and detailed blood analyses, and I found something I couldn't predict. The number of white corpuscles in his blood is greatly above the norm."

"I... don't understand, sensei."

"Nor I am sure, indeed, but I thought about an explanation. Do you remember that your brother has been vaccinated, as well as your sister and you, before arriving at Hinamizawa? The original vaccine hadn't been able to face the new version of the disease, but it slowly adapted, and now it's fighting against the new parasites. Even, I'd say it has already won, or it's on the point of doing it."

"But these are marvelous news!" exclaimed Keiichi "Alice, aren't you happy? Your brother is going to be fine very soon."

Alice wasn't happy, instead: "Sensei, please finish this story... You wouldn't look so sorry, if that was all."

She had got a point. Keiichi turned pale, and he stared at Irie, who bit his lips, and hesitantly replied: "You're right. He has a very high fever, and, as I've just said, the number of white corpuscles in his blood is exaggerated. Too exaggerated. His body had been struck by a very violent and aggressive parasite, and it had been reacting in a way as much violent... until to the point of losing the control of the situation. Now, there are too many white blood cells in his body, and they are attacking not only the parasites, but also all their guest's healthy cells. His brain, his muscles, his bone marrow... his whole organism is under attack now. I mean... he's showing all the symptoms of a fulminating leukemia. It's... a very severe disease."

The others had turned pale in turn, hearing this, and Alice had to sit down on the floor not to fell faint. Rika swallowed, and she asked: "But will he get well, won't he?"

Irie lowered his look: "I... am not sure he will recover soon. Now it's still in a coma, but my opinion is that very probably this state is due to his state of health, and not to the sedative you had injected yesterday. I'm trying to give him emergency cures thanks to very effective and powerful antibiotics, but it won't be anyhow easy..."

Alice, standing up again while helped by Satoshi, made a deep breath, and then she asked to Irie a drastic question: "Is there any chance for him to survive? Please be sincere."

Irie diverted his look from her.

And Alice didn't appreciate it.

"SENSEI, ANSWER ME!" Alice shouted raging, scaring the others around her. "I'VE ASKED YOU IF HE'S GOING TO SURVIVE!"

Irie turned his head, giving a glance to the girl's wide eyes, and the he tightened his lips, trying to find the courage to answer. And finally he said: "I fear not. He has somehow survived to the Syndrome, but this is awfully often a mortal disease too, and inside your brother it's occurring in a particularly violent form. He is... he is going to die in one or two days at most, unless a miracle occurs, I am afraid. I..." he sobbed, not daring to glance at her with shame "I don't know how to tell it, but without my old vaccine nothing so bad would have happened, the new Syndrome would be still in his body, but there wouldn't be this kind of reaction by his immunological system, and now we would keep him sleeping in a medically induced coma, until we could find a cure. Now, instead, we have no time to behave in this way, a coma doesn't stop this kind of pathology."

"Namely" murmured Alice "He won't die because of the disease, but because of your vaccine..."

"I... I... I don't know how to apologize, for this."

Alice didn't answer at once. Then, she only said mechanically "You don't have. Please do only what is necessary and possible to heal him."

Irie liked to find a better answer, but he realized there not words really suitable for the purpose. So, feeling like a coward, he just went out of the room, he had to take care of two people in serious conditions, also Mion needed adequate treatments, she couldn't be forgotten.

Rika, instead, went to Alice. She couldn't let her become prey of despondence, that foolish feud had already overcome too many innocent victims.

"Ali-chan, how are you? Are you sad?" Rika put a hand on Alice's one, but she instantly took it away from it. Alice's hand was cold, without warmth.

"I am... Fine..." the other girl answered, even though her look showed the opposite. She was lying, obviously. She tiredly sat on one of the chairs of the room, and once there she did nothing but looking the table in front of her. Nobody else dared spelling a word of relief, they all were sorry fo what they had heard, and they were not able to find out what they could say to her. And in the end, it was Alice herself who spoke, saying something who made everyone's blood run cold.

"I... guess that... finally, it's my fault."

"Your fault? Why?" asked Satoko, instantly.

"Because... All I've done until now, in my life, has only hurt Nii-chan... The day when we have been born, I had to die... Instead I lived, and they cut his arms because they believed there was magic in his veins, or whatsoever those legends were blathering about. And what about the other things... I had hit great-grandpa's tomb, in the graveyard, and because of this he had concluded we all needed help and he had decided to be the guide of the family, taking upon himself a burden bigger than him. I had got a boyfriend, and he had become even sadder and more melancholic because he wasn't able to find one. I had suggested him to come to Hinamizawa with me, and now we have seen what's just happened."

"Had you... suggested him to come here? It was you who pushed him to join you here?"

"Yes... I hoped to let him spend a pleasant careless period, all our relatives agreed with me, and so I was happy, hoping to have taken the right choice. But instead..." light vanished from her eyes "His fears and his past has persecuted him even here, and they had led him to... to that craziness. Now what will I do? When he had decided to take Dad and Grandpa's place, he took also the sins I was carrying in my heart, and he told me not to worry about anything. I would have never been able to handle the rage present within me, alone... The rage due to what had happened to our relatives, and to the others. And so, thanks to him, I was allowed to live serenely, I had the right to have a normal life. Instead, now... nobody won't atone for my sins anymore."

"Your sins?" yelled Keiichi "What the hell are you talking about? Sins? I don't want you to talk about sins in this way, anymore! You have said that you and your brother had already paid for them, hadn't you? So don't be influenced by them so much! It's something which belongs to the past, think about the present! You are a kind and friendly girl, full of good qualities, don't believe to deserve the worst!"

"I am sorry, but you're wrong. There can't be a single atonement for my sin, my sin can't be washed away only once, because it's something I commit every day of my existence, from the first to the very last one..." She turned at Keiichi, gazing at him with her head tilted onto her right side, and smiling at him blankly. And then she said: "_My sin is to live..._ To be on this Earth, to breath, to eat, to speak, to have feelings... I wasn't supposed to stay here, and instead I am in front of you, and you're seeing the consequences of it."

"It's not true, Ali-chan..." said Rika, who was starting to realize that her brother and her had something in common, finally. When they were little kids, both of them had been feeling guilty for what had happened to the others around them, and they had done everything they could to make her feel better. Their childhood had to have been hard. And, simply, they had followed different paths, to achieve the purpose: Giancarlo had freed them from a heavy burden, the evening he had declared to want to take their place, Alice had become kind and joyful with them, making them having some pleasant and careless time. But now that she was restrained from doing so towards her brother, she was feeling like useless, if not harmful. Therefore, the darkest and saddest side which they could sometimes see in Giancarlo's nature was now appearing also in her sister, as if the sorrow and the evil which once lived in his soul were moving into hers.

And, in fact, Alice said: "I have no choice... If Nii-chan dies, it's my turn to take his place. Dad or Grandpa would never be able to do it, they wouldn't stand the fact that my brother has been driven to foolishness even because of the charge they had given him. And in this way I will compensate everyone for my life."

"You are just telling nonsense!" yelled Keiichi "Can you explain to us once and for all why is being the guide of your family so hard and sad? Craziness due to pain caused by what somebody else has done in the past? Living with this ghosts and thinking to be forced to be sad because of them? Believing in this kind of rubbish, this is the real madness!"

"Kei-chan..." Alice whispered. But that passionate speech hadn't convinced her. She approached him, and she replied: "Kei-chan, thank you for your speech, but unluckily you are not right... This is not something belonging only to the past. Because of our great-grandfather, we still have a blind cousin, and he will not recover his sight because it has occurred in the past. And the same goes... or it went... for Nii-chan's arm. But that's not all, there were many people who had lost a lot due to him, who had suffered a lot, and who probably still harbour against him, and then against our family. These marks are not disappeared yet, healing them will be a very long process, you can't forget them in a day. I can't pretend that they behaved normally, as if nothing had happened. They can't, there will always be some trace in their spirits. And so we can't, either. That's why the role of our whole family is to remember what has been, and carry our Cross. Holding power and having responsibilities is always so."

"You're wrong, you're wrong..." repeated then Keiichi, frustrated not to be able to make her change her mind, or raise her mood. He couldn't remember that, but that scene was similar to what had taken place in another world, to the dialogue between Rena and him at the pit: when she had killed Rina and Teppei, and she had asked him what else she could do. He had not been able to give an answer, and in both of the cases, that morning in the Clinic like that far evening in the pit, he had been blaming himself for not being able to see that side of his friends, and for not helping them before it was too late.

And as a matter of fact, he didn't know what to say, when Alice asked him: "Let's hear, then, what should I do now, once Nii-chan is no more alive? Forgetting him quickly? Living together with his memory? I'm listening to you, so please answer, but you must tell me why I should take the choice you're suggesting."

Keiichi remained mute, and Alice closed her eyes: "I knew that, you don't know what to answer. But I am not condemning you for that, adults' world is full of difficult moments and painful decisions. The truth is that all our family is destined to be unhappy for the rest of our life. You have attended my brother's end: he had been trying to go through that way alone, to give us a better future, and this is the result..." She nodded, while his eyes filled up with tears "My fate is not a happy one, and the one of all my family, too... I should... leave my boyfriend, at least his life will be happier than mine..."

She put a hand on her mouth, as to avoid to vomit. "I am sorry, I am not feeling very well. I need a breath of fresh air."

"We will come out with you, Ali-chan." said Keiichi "You are not alone, yet."

Alice smiled, perhaps it was one of courtesy, or rather it was a sincere one. The others were not sure, but they returned with grins and smiles, and they all went out. All, excluding Rika and Hanyuu, who heard Keiichi exclaiming, while exiting: "Ali-chan, you mustn't be so pessimistic. You brother has not died yet, has he? Haven't you seen movies where people looked to be destined to die with no chance to escape, and where they are able to survive thanks to a miracle? Hold out, don't lose your hope. Things like this happen incredibly often, and during the last summer we have already seen..."

They didn't hear more words, the door had been closed back. And then Rika went back to the room where Giancarlo was, to look at the cardiogram another time.

_...  
_

HEART RATE: 65 bpm

_..._

He was sleeping, so Hanyuu and Rika were like alone, and the latter was allowed to speak without being heard by the others: "You are marvelous, Keiichi, you never give up... But you're asking that Gi-chan may survive thanks to a miracle, now. You're looking for a miracle, but a miracle which will never happen, this time..."

"Never? Why, Rika?" asked Hanyuu "When we fought against Takano, a miracle did happen..."

"Yes, but because we all wished for a miracle, with all our hearts and souls. Since, in order to make it become reality, it's strictly necessary that everyone desires it. But here comes the hitch... This requisite will never be fulfilled, I fear, because there is someone who wants it _not_ to happen."

"But we're all hoping that Gi-chan is able to survive! Why are you saying someone here wants him dead? Even if he had attacked Mii-chan, we all know the truth, and there is nobody who hates him up to this point, among us! Even, nobody would either scold him, for that!"

"It's not true. It's not true that everyone wishes his recovery. Because Gi-chan himself desired to die, before falling into his coma. And, as far as he's alive, a part of him will go on desiring it, preventing this miracle from happening."

Hanyuu stayed immobile: "In your opinion, then... didn't he want to be saved, yesterday?"

"He didn't. And I know why. The very first thing he said when I found him in that cave was to stay far from him, because he was a monster. He was touching his arm, while claiming that... What kind of monster could he ever presume to be? Takano's scrapbooks don't exist anymore, so it must be something linked to the legends and tales he was told when he was very young. Not Demons or Alien invasions, but rather... I think that, in that moment, he believed that what he knew about the supposed magical circuits in his arm was true. That his..._ Sympathiae Sanguis _was real, and that they were there to force him to chase and kill Demons. Do you remember? it had told us, once."

Hanyuu nodded. She was aware that her descendant was keen on old traditions, and that she was perfectly keeping in mind what she had been told about the Sercos' ones. But on the other hand, if what Rika had reminded her was true, there was only a logic conclusion: "He must have thought to be influenced by what was present inside his wounded arm, and then he had concluded that he had attacked Mii-chan because she was said to be a _Demon_. Which was something he didn't really want to do, for the reason we all have intuited, by now."

"Namely..." Hanyuu finished her argument "Did he wanted to die because he feared to harm Mii-chan another time, if he was able to survive?"

"Yes... He had bitten his arm so many times because he was trying not to be subdued by it, it was refusing to obey to that sort of order given by his suggestion_, _he didn't want to attack devils... And even now that he may be not under the effect of the Syndrome anymore, trusting what Irie-sensei had told before, but surely his last wish before falling unconscious was desperate and full of anguish. And this won't change unless he wakes up, which won't happen because he was desperate and full of anguish. It's like a dog chasing its tail... Damn it." she bit her fingernails nervously.

"So his last desire is the one who really matters..." Hanyuu commented.

"Indeed. He can't change his will, as far as he's not conscious. It's even... reasonable, after all. It's like respecting the last will written on a dying person's testament." Rika bit her lower lip, saying that. It was not a bright metaphor, even if it fit in the actual scenario.

Hanyuu, nay, had understood what she meant, and she was desperately attempting to find out what was waiting for them: "I'm... so sorry for him, and for his family... However... Rika, I was reflecting about a thing... In your opinion, what will become of them? Of Gi-chan and Ali-chan, and of their family? Do you think that what had happened in the other worlds, and what he had dreamed in this... Do you think that it will take place even here, now that he can't avoid it?"

"That story where everyone at their home goes crazy, and where they all kill each other? Do you think that Alice might..." that possibility made the blue-haired girl get upset "I wouldn't know... Surely, that loss would be a terrible blow for her, but... Those facts were something which had always occurred in the period when they were little, as far as I know. I couldn't say whether there are still the circumstance which may make that destiny repeat... But surely their future won't be that happy."

Rika tried to walk to one of the chairs, but she stopped when she was more or less a meter far from it: "I don't like this story. Rena can only give us a moral support, Mii-chan is woozy and numb with the ATPC, Gi-chan is going to leave us, and I..."

"And... you...?" Why was Rika talking about herself? Hanyuu didn't expect this end of phrase, and she turned at her, getting shocked. Her little friend had fallen to the ground, like destroyed by a huge effort.

"Ugh..." she cried, touching her chest by the zone where her heart was.

"Rika! Rika! How are you? Please, answer me!"

"What... an idiot question. I'm... not that fine, as you can see." Rika answered, ponderously standing up again, and clambering on the chair to sit on it and rest "It had hurt for a while, but I couldn't let the others see it. And finally it's not a surprise, if you reflect about what's happening here... Do you remember the seal Ouka had placed next to my heart?"

Hanyuu instantly realized what she was referring to: "Oh my Goodness..."

Rika nodded, sweating: "The spiritual seal which is supposed to break and kill me. Gi-chan, when all is said and done, has chosen to die in order to save Mii-chan, so he has chosen... to sacrifice himself... And if he completes this step, the condition which makes the seal explode will be satisfied, and I..."

"Please, Rika, don't say that! We must bring you to..."

"To where? Irie-sensei can do nothing, this is not a normal illness!" replied Rika "Don't worry, he's still alive, and at the moment I am to. I'd say that thankfully I will be pretty fine, unless he dies. Now we have to do everything we can before our end comes, you should know that if I die you will disappear from this world, too. You can't stay here, if I am not here with you."

"I see... Rika, I am scared. What can we do, in such a short lapse of time? And what will become of the others, once we are no more with them?"

"This is what frightens me the most... More than half of the club will be knocked out, if that moment ever arrives. And Keiichi-kun needs the support of a lot of people, to show his best qualities. Alone, without many of his friends... he will feel lost, like in those worlds where he had distrusted us, and the ones where he had tried to rescue Satoko without asking for help. Ali-chan, without her brother, looks so weak, with no spurs to fight... While on the other hand Shii-chan will never surrender, but you know how she can sometimes lose her temper, and without people who can help her to keep a grip on herself, she's like a time bomb. And I don't know what the others could ever do, alone..."

"Rika..."

"Our group is like collapsing... Looking always for the others' help has always been our best virtue, but it can be also seen also as our weak point, we can't deny that we depend on each other... And our enemies knew it, they have taken advantage of it. They have hit some of us, isolating us from the rest of the village by claiming it was a feud involving only the Sonozaki family, and still we don't know how to react. Because they won't stop when they get the power within the clan, Ouka had clearly said she wanted to get rid of all of us, and even Goemon and Megumi must have this will, in the end... Ugh!"

Rika's heart ached again, as if they were stabbing her. Her temples were throbbing, spit filled her mouth. She fell again to the ground, but she leaned a hand on the floor to avoid to lay completely down, and she put the other on her chest, sturdily seizing it and gritting her teeth, to feel less pain. She was gasping, she was like choking, she wasn't perceiving the fresh air coming into her body anymore.

"Damn you, Ouka..." Rika exclaimed, when the pain got bearable again "I don't know if Goemon believed in all this things, spiritual signs, priestesses coming from the past, before meeting her... But surely he didn't know us so well to plan this alone. Ouka did, instead, she had observed us during all this time, and since the very beginning she knew things we ignored about, like the ATPC. She has arranged a perfect plan, Gi-chan has been chosen for the injection because he was alone, but everyone would have served their purpose, Mii-chan was already weak and shocked by what had occurred in the last weeks, and she always cares about her friends in a nearly excessive manner, to the point of being irreparably traumatized. I have to admit it, Ouka has considered all the details, and Goemon has evidently trusted her... Ugh!" Rika closed her eyes another time.

"Rika, don't strive so! Now let's go home, immediately! Being healed at the Clinic may be useless, but you need at least some rest!"

"O... OK... I guess I can give still some helpful suggestion, even after going to bed... We'd better use my bike, fortunately our house is not so far. I wouldn't like to be a nuisance, but I've no alternatives..."

"Don't worry, I don't leave you alone for sure. Wait only a moment, we will be out of here in a flash."

"Thank you, Hanyuu..."

"Nothing special, Rika." Smiling, Hanyuu began to run to the exit of the door, but oddly she felt the need to stop. She had the impression that her descendant wanted to say something else to her. And she was right: "Hanyuu?"

"I am here, go ahead."

The other one was hiding her face, but the purple-haired girl could still hear the other one sobbing. And in fact, Rika was calling her because of the fear which was gnawing her heart and her spirit, because of the terror she was obliged to cope with. She was feeling like powerless, in front of the disaster which was about to overwhelm her world. "I... I am scared, Hanyuu..." she concluded, starting to cry.

_...  
_

HEART RATE: 63 bpm

_..._


	48. Border of Life

**48 – Border of Life**

_Hinamizawa, 28th February 1984_

Rika was feeling like agonizing. It was already late all the doors and windows of their little house had been locked to keep the heat inside, and Hanyuu had obliged her to go to bed, hoping that rest could alleviate the intense pangs she was suffering from time to time. But even there the atrocious pain she was suffering in her heart didn't want to hear a thing about ceasing. She already knew she was about to spent a long sleepless night, and no sleeping drug could help her. Maybe the only one who might be effective was the one she had injected to Giancarlo the day before, to prevent him from killing himself. She had still one or two syringes of it, somewhere in one of closets, she had asked for Irie to give her multiple doses of it. But perhaps it could turn out to be too effective, they had been prepared to work on an individual twice older and bigger than her, and if she took it she would sleep for too much time. It was not time to doze peacefully.

She was troubled. She was aware that tomorrow morning she was supposed to join the others, in order to decide about the next moves. She had to go to the Clinic, to visit her friends, and meet the others, but how could she do that, tormented by that endless ache? She didn't want them to notice it, but her absence would have drawn the others' attention, especially in a moment like that. What might she tell them, to tranquillize them... Unluckily, there was nothing she could cook up, in the presence of them she couldn't act as if nothing had happened, the pain was too aching, and they would get the hang of it. They would compel her to stay at the Clinic, but it would be useless, and she still wanted to help them...

And in these cases it never rained, but it poured. Hanyuu was not with her, now. Where had she gone? Rika couldn't stand up and search for her, she wasn't fit to do it. And she couldn't either try to contact her telepathically, as her ancestor could: in their case it was a one-way kind of communication, because Hanyuu was the only one who could do it, and only from a very short distance; Rika, instead, couldn't avail of that power, she was not a demon and in order to say something to her she had to speak like everyone. And so, before leaving, her ancestor had only told her she was going out, but without explaining the reason, and there was no way for her descendant to know more. Hanyuu looked so thoughtful, in that moment, and Rika couldn't catch what was going on through her mind. She hoped she hadn't taken a desperate choice, a further sacrifice... Since the first one had been committed, they had nothing to lose, from this point of view. _But still, I don't want her to do any follies... _

Fortunately, she did not. She had said the bare minimum to her only because she wished to focus as much as possible. It wasn't going to be a piece of cake.

On foot, she had reached the clinic. It had been a silent walk, unseen by everybody. In fact, it was past midnight, and during the trip she had met nobody, there was no living soul still walking in the countryside. It was too cold. In Hinamizawa like in any other village or city, humans were in their comfortable houses, and there were not cicadas or moths around her, they all had died when weather had started to get cold, in autumn, and their sons were still sleeping in the form of grubs, waiting for the next summer to fly, jump and sing. So, there was nobody with her, in front of entrance.

Nearly all the external lights of the building had been turned off, and the doors had all been closed, but they were not a problem, for her. With a simple trick, she made the main door travel back in time, to the moment of the day when it was still open, and so she could go over the threshold before the effects had ended, and the door became locked again. Since she was not a spirit anymore and she had assumed a material form, her ability to manipulate time had now only a brief temporary effect which lasted only a few seconds and she had to concentrate for several minutes to obtain this result. In a wild battle these limitations would have made it a useless power, but in this case they were acceptable, she was not in a hurry. She had all the night.

She walked inside the Clinic, trying to orient herself through the darkness. There was nobody awake, there, Irie had already gone to his house some hour before, to have some deserved rest, exactly like Takano-san. Inside, only silence was present, the air was quickly getting cold because the heating system of the upper floors had been disconnected, and at a first glance the building looked completely empty.

But Hanyuu knew it was not true. She went to the door leading to the basement, she stopped in front of it to focus, and using again the knack before she crossed it too. She then went downstairs, and finally she reached the destination of her trip.

Next to her, there were two open doors, each of which was the entrance of a room with a patient inside. Two identical environments, aseptic and clean like the ones of every decent hospital, but to the eyes of Hanyuu they showed a sad and sinister look, because they contained two people with a tragic story behind them.

First, Hanyuu went to the one on her left. She gave a glance inside, and then she didn't ask the permission to enter, because she already knew nobody was about to answer. In fact, there she found Mion, sleeping. She was alone, everyone at the Manor was still working to give their assistance to their leader, making phone calls, being informed about news... Even if the ruler couldn't guide them anymore because she was "momentarily absent", as Shion preferred to say. Probably nobody of the ones living at the Manor itself had gone to bed yet, they were all fully engaged. This meant also that no one from the family had come there to keep a watch on her health, but it was not strange, Irie had assured them that physically she was absolutely fine, all the data he had gathered that day about her had proved it. The best thing for her was sleeping, and staying at the Clinic. She was not alone, in the end, someone had offered to stay there on the basement, but this person was not there, at the moment.

Hanyuu was thinking about this one, in fact. She knew she had to avoid her, it would be embarrassing if she was found there and mistaken for a thief or a prowler. But she had to risk, she was doing that in a good faith, and therefore the first thing to do was getting where she was, and explaining her what she was going to do. She wasn't in Mion's room, so she was likely in the other... But before exiting, she looked back at the unlucky pony-tailed girl. Apparently she was sleeping quietly, like a princess waiting for a kiss by a beloved prince who was going to never come, and all the machines who were monitoring her didn't give any warning. _I'd better leave her alone, silently. _Hanyuu thought _I only hope to save you too, by doing what I'm intending to do to him..._

She left the room, and she reached the adjacent one.

"Here she is..." Hanyuu whispered softly. Sat on a chair next to the bed, Alice was sleeping in turn. Until a few minutes before, she had stayed awake to guard over her brother and Mion, but finally tiredness had prevailed against her, and she couldn't avoid to fall asleep, pushing herself forward and stretching the upper part of her body on the bed itself. Hanyuu looked at her, her cheeks were still red and wet, and her sleep was restless. She had been crying, before. It had been a sorrowful and tiring day for her, the worst one of her life, and the purple-haired girl didn't dare to disturb her.

After all, the fact Alice was sleeping was a good thing, for her. She hadn't to explain her what she was planning, and as a matter of fact she was not there for her. She was there for the one who was sleeping under her arms.

…

HEART RATE: 57 bpm

…

Even Giancarlo was sleeping, again. He had slept the whole day, and he was destined to sleep the whole night too... "I hope to prevent him from sleeping forever" Hanyuu said in a fainted voice. She was here for him. She had heard Rika explaining to her that his last wish was to die, to forbid a miracle... But perhaps she could still change his mind, even if he was in an unconscious state. Every other person all over the Earth would have been unable to talk with someone in a coma, but she could. She was the spirit of an elder Demon, she might be able to reach his soul in time, before he passed away, and to speak with him with the strength of her spiritual energy.

It was something she had used only once, far in the past, when she was really alive and Hinamizawa still carried its old name as Onigafuchi. That time, a person had been seriously wounded, and the inhabitants were going on charging a farmer who claimed to be innocent. To know the truth, she had gone to the house where the victim still lived, and she had contacted his soul to make him tell the name of his real murderer. In this way she had been able to get the truth and she had helped the farmer, but that spell was not a healing one, she didn't know any of them, so the unlucky man died a few minutes later.

That was one of the situations which made people distrust her. A being with strange powers, who hadn't saved their fellow's life. She was suspicious. If she hadn't horns, they would have called her a witch, and they would have burnt her at the stake. Moreover, that farmer had quite a lot of enemies, who had been the ones charging him, and who didn't appreciate her gesture... Feuds were present even in that era. And so, together with other ones, it had been the reason of the her rejection by the rest of the village, who finally had forced her to ask for Ouka to kill her. "That farmer had been killed too, in the end, I had not been able to save anybody, that day." she whispered to herself "And, maybe, my powers will save nobody even today... Even if I convince him, I can't be sure that this miracle will ever happen. But... I must try. At least I want to allow him to have a peaceful death, if this is the case... This is all I can do, Rika, I will show myself not to be a useless God..."

She closed her eyes, making sure not to touch Alice to let her go on sleeping, and she concentrated for more than a quarter-hour, before trying to contact his spirit.

She leaned her right hand on his chest, and it began to emanate a warm azure aura.

_Gi-chan..._

_Gi-chan..._

_Gi-chan..._

No answer.

Hanyuu opened her eyes again. She hadn't been able to find him, to set a bond between his soul and hers. "How... How is possible? Have my powers got so weak? The other time I had been able to do it, at least..." She put a hand above the zone of his chest where his heart was, and she perceived no heat coming from it. "It's like... His soul has already left this body. But he's still alive, so this should be impossible. Where am I getting wrong? I should make another attempt."

She focused again, having recourse to all her power, and when she felt like having collected her strength, she proceeded.

Nothing.

"As if he had already dead..." guessed Hanyuu "Have I arrived too late?" It was so frustrating to realize to be useless. But there wasn't a lot she could do. Alice, by her, was slightly trembling. She wasn't wearing her coat, while she was awake she wasn't feeling cold due to the anguish she was living. But Hanyuu couldn't cover her with a curtain, she might think her brother or Mion had given it to her, and she didn't want to generate fake hopes. She then went to the device which regulate the heating system of the basement, and she turned the thermostat a pair of degrees up.

Once she had made it, she turned back again, and she looked at the bed. Seeing the two brothers sleeping peacefully together would have been a cute scene, usually, but not in that case. That innocent scene was the result of a tragedy, and apparently the ending waiting for them didn't either give them the chance to hope.

Hanyuu sat down to the floor, disappointed for her uselessness, and she kept on staring at her unlucky friends. But she soon realized that, from that position, she could see there was something under the bed. _What is it? _The purple-haired girl stood up, she approached the bed and she bowed down, to see what was it.

"A... sword?" It was a sword, well closed in its sheath. Why was it there?

Hanyuu knew that Alice was good at fencing, and it didn't look a katana, but rather a short-sized weapon, a Western one. It was nothing special, there were millions of swords like that one, but on its hilt Hanyuu could read the words _In hoc signo vinces,_ engraved on it. It was evidently Latin, but Hanyuu didn't speak it, and then she wondered what that motto meant.

However, probably that sword belonged to Alice, and she had placed it there not to let the others see it, a sword inside a Clinic would sow discord. For the girl, it would have been enough to make his bed when necessary, and nobody would have seen it. And even if Takano had noticed it, it wasn't a real problem, her state of depression made her easy to convince not to reveal it to Irie.

But why had Alice carried it with her? Did she wanted to... commit suicide, after Giancarlo's death? Hanyuu swallowed, but she soon comprehended to have made a too precipitous conclusion. That was not plausible. Alice liked to be the focus of the attention, but not in this kind of moments. Moreover, there were many other ways to do that more safely, such an object could always be found by someone. Without forgetting that she had never talked about suicide, the day before. She had despised her existence, but she hadn't told anything about ending it; on the contrary, she had talked about staying alive, and... sacrificing herself, by resuming what her brother had started. _Sacrificing, _Hanyuu had never hated a word so explicitly.

But therefore, which reason had pushed her to bring it there? Hanyuu thought a lot of time about it, there wasn't much else she could do. She remembered what the girl had told her, and to the others as well. When she was a little girl, she had begun to play foil because she wanted somehow to protect her brother, like a real swordswoman... So, perhaps it was an irrational way to guard over him. A manner to show she was doing her best, to prove to herself she still desired to do it, and to try to comfort herself. She had to be feeling like a useless sister, and her subconscious side was at least given some relief. Hanyuu thought she wouldn't be wrong, if she guessed it was even a lucky charm, for Alice.

Still, a weapon in one of the rooms of a Clinic was disturbing... Had she to get it away? Or maybe it was better to let it there... No, the truth was that she couldn't take it at all. Nobody knew she was there, and nobody had to know it, excluding Rika. Alice would have discovered its disappearance, and Hanyuu couldn't foresee how she would have reacted, most of all considering how upset she already was. The others would have assisted her, once her brother was no more alive, they surely would have prevented her from doing that final act of desperation, and she would have been with them.

She'd better not to touch anything. And so there wasn't much else she could do, there. She preferred to go home, there she might be able to assist Rika more than what she had done towards Giancarlo... But in her heart she was still fearing to be useless, like so many times in the past.

…

The morning after, at the Clinic, nobody noticed that someone had visited the basement during the night. Irie was not a clairvoyant, and he couldn't suspect it, everything was at its place. He had opened the main door of the Clinic at half past seven as usual, and as usual he had gone downstairs to check the health of who was on the lower floor, always followed by Takano. He went over the heavy metal door which was at the end of the flight of stairs, and he entered. Once there, he found that everything was normal... The only thing a bit strange was the fact that the temperature looked slightly higher than how it was in the previous days, but maybe it was only his impression, or rather Alice had touched the thermostat because she was feeling cold. Nothing worrisome.

Therefore, he entered the room where Mion was. She seemed just like how he had left her. Sleeping. Her rest was not a natural one, but it wasn't due to a drug he had administered to her. It was due to that substance which was pulsing through her veins, and he didn't know how to stop it. The ATPC was not a helper anymore... it was only an enemy, now.

He had to find a way to heal her. But he was alone, with a limited fund, there was nobody who could undertake it with him. The other doctors of the Clinic were aware of the young's conditions, they had seen them while they were brought inside the building, and they knew where they were; but at the same time they ignored the real diseases they were suffering from. Irie still wanted to keep the existence of the Syndrome hidden to the public, and he feared that concealing the truth from his colleagues was going to be difficult. But they had shown no interest in those patients. No interest at all. They were not paying ones, Irie had hosted them for free, as guests, and the other medics didn't care about people who substantially didn't give any money to them. Insensible doctors, they had forgotten their Hippocratic oath... But finally that was why Hanyuu had found nobody inside the Clinic, the night before: since those patients were not regular ones there was nobody in charge of guarding them, and at least this had made Irie's job easier, he hadn't had to give them any explanation.

Irie quickly got the data he needed about Mion, and then he turned back to exit from her room. Next, it was Giancarlo's turn, and there the doctor would have found also Alice. It was still early, and the doctor deduced that she was sleeping, likely not far from her brother. If she had heard their steps she would have come to greet them, and to be told about any piece of news she might be interested in. He would have liked to let her rest more time, it had been a hard night for her, but he couldn't, the boy had to be continuously monitored, and moreover she had also to give him back her copy of the key of the main door, which she had borrowed for the night. Being locked in a building is never a good idea, she might need to exit for any reason.

Giancarlo's health had to be checked again... Even if there wasn't much more he could do, for him. His conditions were nearly desperate, and Irie was powerless, aside from prescribing a cure based on antibiotics. The best thing he could do was consoling and encouraging Alice... But then Takano'd better to stay in Mion's room, she was sad and disheartening like always in the last months, and if Alice had seen her with that mood, Irie's words would have sounded fake and hypocritical.

Then, he told her a little lie: "Takano-san, would you stay here next to Mion-san? I would like you to keep an eye on her and to tell me at once if something happens." He already knew that nothing would have occurred, but it was the simplest way to reach his purpose.

In fact, the nurse immediately nodded, there was no reason for her to go to the other room. So Irie smiled, and he exited from the room.

Once he got over the door, he turned left, and in that moment he was hit from behind, and he fainted.

…

A man running into the wood behind the Clinic. The body of a girl upon his shoulders, and a car waiting for him not far from him.

Everything had been as programmed. At that hour the first patients had already arrived to take a seat and being seen, but there were not doctors or nurses yet, Irie and Takano apart. Then, his master had thought about a simple plan, which had worked perfectly. They knew their target was there, and they had studied the doctor's behavior, and his collaborators: Irie, each time he went down the basement, was used to never close back the door, because his presence could be required upstairs at any moment by any patient or guest, due to his role inside the Clinic. If another nurse was at the counter, he usually asked her to tell the ills to stay on the main floor and wait some minute, but that day he had gone downstairs very early, understandably worried about the two young, and he hadn't awaited any of them.

So, the man could follow them. After knocking out the doctor, he knew also that Takano would have been too weak and scared to try a vague reaction, and she wouldn't have dared to be in his way, so he could pick up Mion without being disturbed and go back through the same path he had followed to enter. And once on the low ground again, he had placed the pony-tailed girl's body on a couch he had previously prepared next to the door, before pushing him out of the building, pretending that she was a patient needing a breath of fresh air. There were not nurses next to the counter yet, they all had still to arrive, and nobody would have caused him trouble.

And therefore, now he was running, without fearing anything, he would have reached his car in less than a couple of minutes. But there was something else making him worried. The girl he was carrying had not awaken yet. Had they given to her a calmative? No, it couldn't be, they were in the middle of a tempest, it would be mindless to force their leader to sleep in that way. But if she wasn't under sedation, why hadn't she opened her eyes yet? Maybe because of that strange substance his master had talked about? It was possible.

But he didn't like it. Operating in this way was not loyal at all, and she was feeling like doing something unfair towards people who had never harmed him. It was dishonorable. But this was a precise order by his master, and he had to obey. All he could do was granting her sake until he had brought her where he had to...

"Here you are, finally."

A voice blocked his run. He turned to the right, and he saw the one who had spoken.

"Oh, look who's here... Aren't you Megumi-san's bodyguard?"

"And you are that Western girl..."

Alice showed behind one of the trees, and she gazed at him, before saying: "I'd suggest you to put her down, we have to set a couple of matters straight. You know, I could stop you before... I had seen you going upstairs from the basement, but I was too far, and I couldn't stop you at the Clinic because there were too many people there, and I don't know much about you. But here we are alone."

The man obeyed, laying Mion down next to one of the trees around them: "Did you think I might use them as hostage? I am not that kind of person. But so you're coming from the building too, you were in one of the other rooms... May I ask you how have you been able to go before me? I didn't run so slow, and you're neither panting."

"It was enough to ring around you. I had come here with my bike, yesterday, so I took it again, and following you was not that hard. Your car is right behind here, so it was obvious to get where were you going."

"I see."

Alice looked angry. As if she was trying to forget her worries, to sublimate the pain she had felt. For her, the man in front of him represented all the evil the others and she had to face, and she was ready to unbosom all her fury on him, like on a scapegoat. He would have paid for everything they had done, and she would have made peace with herself. She would have shown to be able to shelter the ones she cared, that's why she was getting so aggressive, now.

In fact, she was concerned about Mion, now. Nobody expected their enemies to come to the Clinic. There had to be an aim, if they had tried to abduct her. So she asked: "Well, now it's your turn. Why have you taken her? What do you want to do, can't you see she suffered sufficiently?"

"Sorry, but I can't answer to this."

"Why? Has your master forbidden you to do that? For sure he wasn't expecting you were reached by anybody, I don't believe he said something like _If you're captured, keep your mouth shut._"

"You're not wrong. But this would anyway be my master's will, you can easily deduce it, so I respect it even if he hasn't told it aloud."

"As you wish." she replied "And then, if you ask you to leave her here and go away, you will refuse again, am I right?"

"You are."

"I understand. Then, I have only a choice." she unsheathed the sword she had hidden under her brother's bed. "I can do nothing but repeating it under menace."

The other man, with a feline reflex, put a hand under the sleeve of the other hand, and a knife appeared.

"And what if I don't obey yet? Are you going to attack me?"

Alice lowered her sight, and then she answered: "Yes. This will be my decision. I was not by my brother, when he needed my help, and I couldn't protect him. But I still can help my friends, my whole life will make a sense if I do it, and I'm sure this is what Nii-chan would like me to do. So" she looked at him full of wrath and aggressiveness "What's your final answer?"

"Telling it is even superfluous." he put his knife out of its case "This is my duty. It's nothing personal, but if you go on barring my way, it's my duty to get rid of you."

"OK, that's fine." Alice raised her guard "I still don't want to murder you, but blocking you and saving Mii-chan is more important than your own life, for me, so I won't hesitate if it turns out to be necessary. As far as I know, killing you might save her live, so I have to decide between your soul and hers. Which one will I choose, in your opinion?"

"Pff", the other muttered "You have decided only to die. You had taken this choice, so don't blame me if your heart stops beating."

"WE WILL SEE!" shouted Alice, to psych herself up, and then she went at him, fast like a Fury.

…

WARNING!

HEART RATE: 49 bpm

…


	49. Spreading wings out

**49 – Spreading wings out**

_Hinamizawa, 29th February 1984_

_…_

WARNING!

HEART RATE: 47 bpm

…

The first assault was fruitless. The man was fast enough to dodge her lunge, and to counterattack with his dagger, obliging Alice to back away to avoid it. Even before beginning the duel, she was aware it would have not been a piece of walk. She had seen how quickly he had moved the day when they had met him for the first time. He had cut Mion's kimono before anyone could stop him, neither Kasai had been able to forestall him. And if her enemy was really a bodyguard he knew how to defend himself, and how to neutralize his opponent. She had to be careful.

But in the end her primary objective was not to kill or harm him. She only had to gain time. At the Clinic, before starting to chase the aggressor, she had seen that Irie was on the ground, fainted. But he looked fine, and Takano, too. It wouldn't have taken a lot of time for him to revive and call the police, and even in the case he didn't wake in good time, the nurse would have done it for him. They were not far from the building, they would have found them soon if she had been able to block him, even only temporarily.

If only Mion could react... She would have been a valuable helper, a good fighter like her would have been a godsend. Instead she was still sleeping, as though nothing around her was happening. But Alice was there for her, finally, she was trying to rescue her. If she could have helped her, she wouldn't have allowed him to kidnap her, and there would have been no problems. Now, instead, Alice had to do everything alone.

On the other hand, was he trying to kill her, or did he just wanted to make her harmless? It was hard to say, at a first glance. After all, leaving dead corpses behind didn't look a good idea, for who was escaping... But also taking Mion and bring her where they wanted to seemed nonsense, too. They had a plan she couldn't get at the moment, and maybe they really desired to make her life end. Moreover, the man's first hit was most likely aiming at her heart. He wasn't kidding.

Alice observed the man, to study him and analyze his moves. In that moment he was looking in turn at her, holding his knife high, and apparently ready to another attack. He had seen she was acting seriously, and that she wasn't scared by the idea of a fight. His attitude was showing that he had accepted her challenge. Now he was slightly tipping forward, as to preparing to charge, and-

He ran fast as a thunder, the knife aiming at Alice's neck, in no time the silver blade was next to the girl's eyes, and-

A metallic noise.

With an instantaneous reflex, she had been able to raise her sword and divert his stab, before it could reach her.

Recoiling, she made a step backward, like she was trying not to fall to the ground, but she immediately stopped. He was pointing at her throat, and that blow would have been fatal, if it had been successful. Then he was resolute to kill her. He probably had been told to act so, he had been told to get rid of any nuisance in the quickest way. That mission had to be of paramount importance, for them.

He had been fast, however. Much more than what she was expecting. She neither knew precisely how she had parried his hit, it had been an instinctive defense, rather than a voluntary response. But the truth was that he was an excellent fighter, surely much a better one than her. Defeating him would have been nearly impossible, unless she benefitted from an unpredictable stroke of luck. The best thing was to try to end the match in a tie, until the moment when the others finally arrived and helped her.

She was recognizing that he was stronger than her, after a single assault, even though his knife was perhaps inferior to her weapon. She was already aware her skills still needed improvements, before leaving to Japan her fencing teacher had explained her what were actually her limits. She always loved to think about the next moves, about the next attack, but she did it even when she had to defend herself, and this was bad, because she had to concentrate more on the most immediate matter. She had to be more patient, he had told her.

But even if she exerted to do it, she didn't manage to plug that gap, and it was due to her inner nature. She had started to play fencing because she loved to fight with a sword, in the end. Running towards her enemies, bests or humans, attacking them and getting sure that they weren't able to harm her, or her family, anymore. Even, the ones she cared most were the ones around her, her relatives, her boyfriend, her friends... Not herself. That was why she was more interesting in attacking rather than in defending herself. She wanted to prove to be useful to the others. Being wounded was not her biggest fear, she was far more scared by not being able to give a hand to the ones around her.

Maybe it would have been different if her brother had joined her in that activity, when they were young. Having a friendly duel, where she didn't look at her opponent like at an extraneous enemy... It would have helped her to focus on all the sides of fencing. It would have been nice... But it was not possible. Giancarlo's arm compelled him not to do that, a thrust in the wrong place and his wounds might have opened again.

She had always trained alone, then, and she had never improved her defensive skills as much as her instructor wished. And in that moment they were what she needed. She had to stall, to wait for the others' moves, she had to be calm. Her teacher had explained to her that duels may be won even thanks to a good guard, and that was the case. She had mostly to set her to a defensive position, even if she didn't like that approach, she hated to stay still and not to move, during a duel as well as during everyday's life. In that way she was looking alike not wishing to solve the problem, waiting for someone else to do it. But now she had no choice, it was destined to be a hard test, one where she had to prove she had learned that lesson, and she could put it into practice. The other one was more skilled, in all probability, while technically she showed some leak, but she would have attempted to hide this difference, and to nullify it by making the right choices. She was going to show her value.

_…_

WARNING!

HEART RATE: 41 bpm

…

"You" yelled Alice, turning to the other "Why are you doing such a despicable thing? I'm not talking about fighting against me, I know I'm the one who has challenged you, but rather about Mii-chan. Seizing a girl who can't protect herself, and bringing her God knows where. And don't answer you're just following the orders."

"I'm just following the orders." he replied, instead.

"Are you mocking me? This is what you had to avoid saying! Even because this excuse doesn't save you from your responsibility! Do you think to be a better person, if the sins you commit are done because of what the others tell you to do?"

The other didn't answer, but he attacked again, and Alice had been forced to do another difficult parry. He didn't look like desiring to chat, they probably had told him to do all as quickly as he could, and talking with her would have been a loss of time.

But speaking and gaining some precious second was exactly what the girl wanted, instead, so she said: "Answer me! Do you think your fault will be forgiven, if you claim to be only a puppet controlled by someone else? You know it's not true, you are doing this because you've accepted to do it! It's too easy, to charge other people for what you do!"

The other was still keeping his mouth close, but reluctantly. She could see how much he wanted to speak and answer, but evidently he couldn't. Then, Alice tried to break down this resistance, and for the third time she exclaimed: "You are guilty exactly like Goemon-san and Megumi-san! At least accept this truth, and don't hide yourself behind what they had ordered you to do."

"So should I defy them?" he finally asked. She had been able to convince him to have a dialogue.

"Probably yes. If they tell you to do something bad, you've the right to answer _No, I can't do it_. You must do it, to save your integrity."

"I owe them a lot, and I swore to serve them. I don't want to put their authority in doubt, I've never wanted to." That sense of honor and duty reminded Daijiro's one. If he had been there, maybe he would have been able to persuade him, he could understand him better than what she could do. But she was alone, instead, so she had to think about it without any external help.

"It makes no difference. Seneca wrote that it was good to defy people if their commands are iniquitous, even if in the past they have helped you." That kind of quote was more like her brother than like her, to tell the truth, but it was also a way to perceive his presence next to her, as if he was by her and fighting with her. She needed not to feel alike being completely alone.

"Seneca? And who is he? A philosopher from your country? He surely didn't know a thing about us, and I can see no reason why he might have said that. You don't care our point of view, and so I don't care foreigners' one. You can't judge me, you come from a different culture. You can't understand what my master represents for me."

"But you don't like what you're doing. I am sure of that. If you did, you'd have answered in a different way, before. Claiming just to follow orders means that you have doubts about them, but that you don't dare questioning them."

"Not necessarily. I may simply not care about them, and about you."

"Is it so?"

The man didn't reply. He was gazing at his knife. Then: "No. The truth is that I fear that my master is trying to do something unfair. Something which personally I wouldn't like to do." He raised his look "But I don't want to disappoint my duty. Trying to convince me would be useless, so don't either start."

"Are you sure?"

"I am sure."

"Why?"

"Because I've made my choice, exactly like you. If this one is wrong, shame on me, I will accept that. But rather, I can see you are not that bad at fighting with that sword, but you are not at my own level. You certainly have already noticed that."

"And?"

"You haven't surrendered yet, your eyes belong to a woman who still wants to fight. I'm not blaming you for this, on the contrary. Going on is a decision of yours. Nobody is obliging you, but your moral duty is pushing you to go on. Can you comprehend what I mean, now? You and I are the same."

"... No, it's not true."

"It is."

"NO, IT'S NOT!" Alice shouted, raging "You understood nothing, because standing here is not a choice... I'm not deciding to deal with you, but I am _forced _to do it. Because of you and your masters, Nii-chan is not with us, he's going... to die. And the role he had had until now, all the responsibilities he had to carry... They have gone to me. Now I have to face them, now it's my duty to do that. This is the only way to redeem my sins, this is the only way I have to prove I was born for a reason." she restrained from crying. The speech she had begun to convince her enemy had ended to harm her more than him.

"I'm here to help Mii-chan, of course" she yelled "But most of all I'm here because this is the only path left to me. If I take Nii-chan's place, I can allow myself to go on living, because I will prove to have the right to live. Yes, this is the answer. If I block you, I will show to be worthy of staying here. And the way I block you won't matter!" She grinned, as if madness had grabbed her soul.

She wasn't lying, that wasn't a manner to scare her enemy. The darkness she had nursed during all those years was finally coming into light. That feeling was exciting, as if she had found the road to follow, as if she had understood what she had to do for all the rest of her life. Being happy is for careless people, in the end, now she was realizing why her brother was always so sad, and that conclusion was making her like relieved, the burden within her heart was looking lighter, now. It was a truth which was making all her doubts vanish, and the girl thought she would have never reached something better than that consciousness. So, the man in front of him was slowly becoming the symbol of this passage from a joyful youth to an adult sadness, and Alice wanted to finish it as soon as she could. She was ready even to kill her enemy, if necessary. If taking his life was indispensable for being useful to the other, she would have done it. To wash away a sin, she didn't mind to commit a heavier one.

_…_

ALARM!

HEART RATE: 37 bpm

…

Sparks flew over the heads of the duelists, created by the encounter of their two blades. Fast, determined, they both were trying to put an end to the other's life, now.

Alice was a worse fighter than her opponent, the other wasn't bluffing, before. His moves were quick and prompt, and the knife in his hand danced like a snake hypnotizing its prey. A moment it was slithering next to the ground, the moment later it was flying up there, above its target's head. Rapid and unpredictable, like an implacable predator, like the three Fates who were used to cut the red wire symbolizing the human life.

But Alice was a match for him. Technically, she was less skilled than him, but she was putting more grit, and her sword ran forward and backward, like the sting of a venomous insect. That duel was incredibly important for her, and her opponent couldn't lower his guard.

The girl was perceiving how vital was her resistance. The others hadn't arrived yet, but she couldn't say how much time had passed, since the beginning of the fight. She could only remember one, two, a thousand attacks and responses, but there had been so few rest between an assault and the following one...

She was feeling strange. Her eyes ached terribly, making her suffer a pain never lived before. Rika had told her how her brother's ones looked, in that cave... they were like a broken mirror. Maybe it was due to his veins, which had swelled and looked like long dark fractures in each of his retinas... His eyes had got black, fully black. Now, then, even hers were so, maybe. She couldn't see them, of course, but they were brother and sister, so it would have been natural. And that man had a couple of hesitations too, while meeting her glance. Her face had to be pretty scary.

Her eyes had to be black, too, and marked by the same lines. The time seemed to have stopped, around her, making that feeling of strangeness more evident. But therefore, wasn't it an effect of the new Syndrome? Rika, describing what had happened, had hypothesized that it was due to the powered version of the parasite, which actually Alice wasn't carrying inside her body; if they had to make an injection, it was because there weren't simpler methods to inoculate the disease, so the others were safe, for the moment. So... what if it wasn't due to the Syndrome? What if it was something already present in their spirits, inside the heart of their souls? It might be something related to what had occurred to their family, to... to their far past.

Hadn't their great-grandfather made deep studies about the _Sympathiae Sanguis_? Something which went beyond the human comprehension and ability, something which overwhelm people's own nature. He wanted to find the way to dominate it, to become a being greater than a mere person, but that element was reportedly already present within him, and within his own descendants. Did it sound absurd? Maybe, but on the other hand they had been told about something similar, once in Japan. They had heard that Hinamizawa's inhabitants were descendants from the Demons, and that some of them still carried one inside themselves. So, if there might be a beastly part inside every villager, then the same could be true about her, too. There might be a sort of devil in her, as well as in her brother, but at home they had simply called it with another name. But in the end, what was it? A demon, a switch which could change people, or what? The answer came to Alice's mind in a flash.

It was their fear, which a lot of factors can make grow up more and more, until it takes the control of their host. It was her greatest wish, too... It was her desire to earn the right to have a happy life.

Yes, it wasn't an independent spirit, separated from the one of the person it was in. On the contrary it was a part of it: it was made of fear, anger, sins, desire, instinctive will... The irrational part of human mind which always sees the environment around the individual only as potential source of menaces and dangers, and so it makes it react in consequence. It's the impulse which pushes the man to fight against the known and the unknown he can't control, no matter if the trouble is real, probable or impossible.

In this case, the danger was real, but it wasn't important... In her blood, Alice could feel her wrath increasing. She had decided to replace her brother, and now she was thinking it was good that his dark side had joined her. She was able to perceive sadness and anger at the same time. Now she could really understand how he had looked like that day at the prefecture, when he had annihilated Nabiha. That wish of destroying what was in front of her. That desire to make him feel what he had caused to the ones she cared. She didn't hate her enemy as such, but she hated him because he wanted to hurt the ones around her. He wanted to alter the serenity of her friends, and so he would have hurt her indirectly. That prospect was scaring her, here was the reason why she was finally hating him. She would have destroyed him, because her role was to guard over the others, and he was trying to do what she couldn't allow him to do. The purpose was the only important thing, the way to reach it was irrelevant. And the purpose was not to let Mion in their hands.

"Won't you ever surrender?" she asked him, after the umpteenth assault.

"No." The other answered.

Alice spit to the ground. "I see. Than... I have no choice. Be ready, because I can't see how I could save both their life and yours. You would never give up, neither if I harm you, neither if I cut your arm off. If you fainted, you'd be a menace again once you wake up."

"Hmph." the other replied, caressing his dagger "And would you be prepared to live with this sin for the rest of your life? To be put under arrest, and being tormented by this memory? I have already experienced this... You might go on living, but you would never be happy."

"I am aware of that. But maybe you don't know my destiny had already been decided. I'm understanding how Nii-chan had been feeling, in all these years, hard choices bring painful consequences and responsibilities... I have taken his place, and so his own sins and sorrow, too... He had always been saying he was not supposed to have a joyful life... And I've realized why, now. Don't care about me, care about yourself. Killing you or not, it won't change anything. This... this is the path I've chosen. I don't have to regret it. If this can make my family and my friends happy, I'll go through it proudly, even if this entails the fact I will never be happy."

She was speaking exactly like her brother, now. She was using his same words.

_…_

ALARM!

HEART RATE: 32 bpm

…

Her opponent was now far from her, so Alice could give a look at the girl still fainted on her right. Mion was still there, senseless...

While fighting, she nearly had believed to be alone, against that man. She had forgotten there was someone else near to them, even if she couldn't do anything. It was an invisible presence.

Alice was succeeding to protect her, for the moment, and she was glad to do it. In the end, she was the one her brother loved... Rika didn't need to reveal to her what she had been told by him. When in autumn she had tried to arrange an engagement between Giancarlo and Rena, the latter had finally refused the proposal, explaining to her that she wasn't fit for that genre of partner. In her opinion, he'd better live with someone who could involve him in what happens around him, a more expansive and energetic girl would have been more suitable for him... _Like Mii-chan, like her. Rena thinks that if they start to stay more time together, they might take a liking on each other. I guess that Gi-chan will like both of Mii-chan's sides, the joyful one and the girly one, once he knows them well. They would mutually complete: Gi-chan needs someone who can give him enthusiasm and desire to make, Mii-chan needs one who stubbornly doesn't surrender and finds what to do in each situation... _

This is what she had told to Alice, that day. The Italian girl was not sure of this, so she had preferred not to horn in on the matter and to observe them without holding up, unlike how Shion had behaved towards her sister and Keiichi. But in the end Rena had been right... When Mion had been obliged to ask for help to everybody, they had often talked to each other about the various issues, and he had begun to appreciate her true nature. And Alice was happy to see that, but she feared to ruin everything by intervening in that story, so she had stayed apart... Even if in this way they didn't know if the pony-tailed girl returned that feeling.

But that last part didn't matter, now. If he had been here with her, he would have done what he could to help her. Then, if she pretended to have his spirit next to her, she had to behave exactly like how he would have in that moment.

If his spirit was with her...

She hoped that. She didn't want to become a disgrace, another time. She was carrying a lone wish, within her heart.

She raised her look to her enemy again, to keep an eye on him...

And she winced.

When had he come so near to her? With an unexpected jump, he had reached her, taking advantage of her moment of hesitation. The regrets still lying at the bottom of her heart had betrayed her, and now she had to parry his hit, she had to parry his hit, she had to parry his hit, before...

...Before it was too late.

But she couldn't.

The knife plunged into her right shoulder, making her crying in pain and letting the sword fall to the ground. With a quick movement, the man kicked the hilt of her weapon, throwing it far from the scene of the fight. Now she was unarmed.

He extracted his dagger, and he contemplated the stains of blood on it. Lots of other red drops were falling from his victim's shoulder, and putting the other hand on the wound didn't prevent it from flowing out.

"Now I hope you will give up." he said, while turning towards the fainted girl and starting to pick her up again "There's nothing you can do, now. Fighting bare-handed would be a suicide, for you." He had considered the fight like closed, and apparently he didn't intend to kill her.

Alice gritted her teeth.

"No... I can't..."

"Keeping on would be useless."

"I CAN'T, I'VE SAID!" she yelled "I've already told you before! I can't allow you to bring her away, I neither know what you want to do to her."

"I've already answered before about that. I don't reveal it to you because I can't. There is not any personal reason for my behavior."

"And then I can't leave you. My brother had given to me a job... Continuing to follow the path he had begun. And since he didn't want Mion to be hurt, I can't allow it to occur. If I save her, even his soul will be relieved, because he won't feel guilty for having tried to do great harm to her, two days ago. He won't feel guilty anymore, and his death would be more serene than his whole life... His life had been like hell, and only because of me..."

"So?"

Alice stared at him, her eyes were red like flames of Hades: "I have not my sword now, but there are rods, and branches here. You will be rushed off your feet, unless you leave her here. This would be Nii-chan's will, so this is mine, too."

He closed his eyes. "Then you are going to die."

Her red eyes still gazed at him, but now also with a glance full of dignity and awareness. And then she answered: "I'm ready for it, if this is my destiny. I am not like Kei-chan, who carries the strength to change people's future, I am weaker than him, and than all the people I know. I am weak, indeed. But I can still taking my choices, and my responsibilities. If I let you do what you want, my fate would be something far worse than death itself, my soul would be tormented by remorse for the rest of my existence... I can't do that. If this is supposed to be Alice Giorgia Serco's last action, let it be!"

She bent forward, and with the healthy shoulder she charged him.

_…_

ALARM!

HEART RATE: 28 bpm

…

With all her strength, she had hit him in his chest, and she had forced him to let Mion fall to the ground another time. It had been the beginning of the final assault, and that first attack had been like a provocation. But she couldn't go on without a weapon. Looking for her sword would have meant showing her back to the enemy, and it would have been her condemn. He would have never permitted her to take it again, so she had to search for a rod, and to use it like a bat. She had already handled Keiichi's and Satoshi's one, a couple of times and for pure fun, and even if it wasn't for sure a sufficient training, it was her only chance. Was there a club, a dry branch, anywhere? Yes, there was some of them, but the problem was that they were among a group of young, thin and slender trees, and the pieces of wood they could produce weren't fit for the purpose.

But she wouldn't have yielded to such a little snag. She couldn't run anywhere, to look for larger rods, the other would have gone away with Mion. So... what about a trunk, rather than a branch? As said, they were thin enough, and there were a couple of them not far from her, torn down by wind or by wild beasts...

No, it was making no sense. They would have been too heavy, anyhow. Especially now that she was able to use only an arm. The only weapon there was her sword, so... she had to pick it up, somehow. She had to make it unarmed for the time necessary to go where he had thrown it, and the only way to do it was charging him another time, until he fell to the grass due to the impact.

_I will make it, _she thought, _I must do it for Mii-chan, for Nii-chan, and for all the others..._ She got ready for another attack, while the others was holding his knife pointed at her, to discourage her from assailing him.

She had only a chance, if she had failed he would have stabbed her another time, and she wouldn't have survived...

She looked her bloodstained hand. The sight of red on it made her more angry, and excited, and determined, and the ache had vanished like magic.

She started to run...

"Mii-chan! Ali-chan! Where are you?"

A voice blocked her bounce. Was it... Satoshi? It was him, yes, that call came from the wood, no more than a hundred meters far from them. And surely he wasn't alone. Satoko, Shion, Flavia, and all the others... They had found them, perhaps because of the long and noisy fight. Exactly like when they were looking for Rena, they had arrived in time.

Immediately, all the fears and all the anguish disappeared from her heart._ I'm so glad, I have been able to save Mii-chan. _She thought, beginning to cry_. So I am not useless, I am not someone who can only hurt people... I did what I desired to do...  
_

"Satoshi-kun!" she shouted happily, turning her head behind to the direction where the voice had come from "We are..."

"I am sorry, but it seems we have no time. I must go away before they can arrive, and I can't permit you to stand again in my way." A stone-cold voice came to her ears, and it froze her spirit. Exactly like some minute before, she had diverted her mind. Exactly like what her teacher had told her several times, she hadn't thought about defending herself.

And her enemy had seized at the opportunity, and he had stabbed her in her heart.

"Ugh..." Alice tasted her own blood come up to her mouth, and she began to sense coldness. That feeling was terrifying her, she had realized what was happening... But at the same time she didn't know if this was a good or a bad thing, she had fulfilled what she wanted to do, and she was not sure whether there was a place for her or not, on this world. When she was young she wished to have never been born, but now maybe she had made something good, so...

Her eyes were not aching anymore... They had turned back normal. She was not angry anymore, against the one who was killing her, or against herself, or against any other. She had made peace with her regrets. _Finally, Nii-chan is going to leave this world with me, Irie had been categorical. We are going to fly up to Heaven, where we will be happy, far from all the pain we had to undergo... But... _A tear came down from her eyes _People here won't be happy yet, our death will make them suffer even more, and there is still a lot to do, to save them. And instead I can do nothing else for them, now, I can't live for more time, and be next to them. I... I think I did what I could, I made my part. The burden Nii-chan had carried for all this time was just too heavy for me, I would have never be able to replace him... After all, we all knew that, even if Nii-chan and I were twins, we were different. We were one the opposite of the other. But... But then, maybe... I don't want him to show me the way, not today, not now..._

_If... If my boyfriend had been here with me, maybe I could have done much more... But... I have no regrets, about myself... I would have liked to have him next to me, now, but he can't..._

_I love you all. And I love you, my dear Al..._

The man drew out his dagger, and Alice felt nothing else.

She fell backwards, and she collapsed to the ground. Her soul was not living in her body, anymore.

Her enemy observed her for a second, with a pitiful look: "I am sorry to have been forced to this, really. I wish you to rest, young lady. You fought for what you believed in, and you are worthy of my respect. I hope you will find the peace you were looking for, you deserved it... You weren't valuing yourself, earlier, but you were much better than what my master is, I fear. But I have no time to waste, if I hurry to take the girl down there, I still can avoid the others."

And so, he left the place of the challenge, leaving the dead corpse of his opponent rest. Her body lied on the soft grass, like a person cradled by the breeze and sleeping on the sweetest of all the beds, and her spread arms were like the wide open wings of a marvelous angel.

Because Alice herself was like an angel, now. Her spirit was flying to the sky, and she was not alone.

_…_

HEART RATE: 0 bpm

…


	50. Point of no return

**50 – Point of no return**

_Hinamizawa, 29th February 1984_

Quiet in his house in Okinomiya, far from the hell he was the author of, Goemon Sonozaki was waiting for his servant's return. He had sent his bodyguard to the village when Sun had still to rise, so some hour had already passed since his departure, but it was still early. Attacking in that moment of the day came in useful not only to take the other faction by surprise, but also to have more time to think about the next moves. He had the whole day in front of him, he was not in a hurry.

The original plan was to take Mion to Okinomiya, at their house. His wife had insisted about the importance of having her at their mercy: once she had been led there, that same afternoon they would have shown her at the members of the clan who supported the changing of the ruler, in order to let them see the tattoo on her back and make them witnesses of her true state of health. And then they would have convened an extraordinary assembly where everyone would have assisted in the girl's final dethronement. Everyone would have been forced to admit that Mion was not able to guide them anymore, and that the one they had seen in the previous days was someone else, likely Shion dressed up as her sister.

Officially, in fact, the whole clan had been told that it was Shion who was at the Clinic, ill and needing rest. And their relatives had no particular doubts about that, since each time they came to the Manor they saw a girl with a ponytail who used to speak to them calmly and resolutely. That illusion was perfect, and they had always thought to speak with Mion, by phone or in person, to such an extent that Shion was spending more time as her sister than as herself. Paradoxically, the Sonozakis' traditional stories were full of curses and bad events about the birth and existence twins within the clan, but having Shion next to her was rather a bless for her sibling, now.

Anyways, in spite of the efforts by the main branch to hide the truth, Goemon had understood it was only a gimmick, even if he couldn't prove it, unless he was able to bring Mion to Okinomiya and show her tattoo to the others. Ouka Furude had told him about the so-called ATPC and about its plausible effects. If there was a sister with those symptoms at the Clinic, then it was nobody but Mion, there couldn't be any chance of mistake. However, he had to move carefully, the ones on his side had to avoid to let the main branch of the family know something about their secret meetings and about what they were planning to do to their actual leader, otherwise they would have messed up everything.

Ouka Furude... He remembered the very first time she had appeared in front of him. He couldn't believe in his own eyes. But that spirit had told him that she had read his heart... and she had seen how much he was eager for revenge. This was what she had explained, and the fact she had claimed to share his same feelings had made him trust her. His wish was too strong to let that chance slip. That girl had shown him all the weakest points of the ones who would have faced him, and how to deal with them.

When had it happened? Just after Nabiha's failure, when the whole village had come in front of the prefecture. With that plan, his wife wanted to isolate Mion and her group from the rest of the family. She had been the one who had made the first step, and she had convinced him to help her. Moving the inhabitants elsewhere would have allowed her to have it easy thanks to the shock and the trauma: Hinamizawa's spirit wouldn't have worked because Hinamizawa itself would have finished to exist, and that young girl alone would have been an easy prey. But something had gone wrong, and Goemon had to be careful not to let Megumi or himself be discovered by the others' searches.

But when he met Ouka... He had found out what was his real purpose... He didn't want mere power within the clan... he wanted to annihilate it, and the whole village with it. And that spirit had illustrated to him the way to do it. She had revealed to him about the Syndrome, and about the importance of Rika's life. And then she had told him that, if a single person within the group surrounding Mion had fallen because of his own sacrifice, the priestess of the Furude Shrine would have died, and the whole Hinamizawa would have been destroyed, not letting any survivor. He wasn't sure to have understood how this was possible, but he had trusted her, because he had realized she did is a powerful spirit and not a normal girl. There was something mystical and supernatural, inside her, so he didn't question what she had said.

And moreover, this was what he wanted to. Ouka had read in her mind, and she had awaken the evilest side of her soul. Like her, he was hating the family he belonged to, and not without reason. She had reminded him why she hated them so much.

"Yuzo..." he whispered "Your son and you will rest finally in peace, and I will join you serene. I will have... my revenge."

Goemon rubbed his eyes, as to wake up from a dream, from a state of ecstasy. He stood up, and he watched the hour. His bodyguard was supposed to come back at any minute... He was sure he would have arrived before than that. He was late.

But it didn't matter, finally. He could even fail, he didn't care about it, he had decided to kidnap Mion only to second his wife's will, to make her calm. He couldn't dissatisfy her, she was a vital pawn for him: between them, she was the one who originally belonged to the clan, as a matter of fact he was only an in-law, and her acquaintances and means were fundamental for him, to reach his purpose. Because her aim was still to gain the control of the family, and nothing else... but his one was different.

"Poor Megumi" he said to himself "She is not imagining that, once Rika is dead, she will follow her same destiny..." He was right, after all. Unlike him, she didn't know a thing about that disease. But at the same time she had lived in Hinamizawa several years, right in the Manor and side by side with Oryou and the main branch of the family. Without the Queen Carrier's influence her life would have ended quickly, exactly like the other ones, quite surely.

Was he sorry for her impending death? He wasn't able to answer to this question. Instead, he was looking like being indifferent. Years before, he had married her because their hatred was what bound them. He had found someone who had a lot of things in common with him. Megumi hated the other Sonozakis as much as he hated Hinamizawa, so she was not an angel. He didn't want explicitly to kill her, but if she had died, nobody would have cried for her. For him, it was nothing more than a necessary step.

And it was going to come soon. At the Clinic, he had a contact. Using her wife's money, had corrupted one of the medics, who was keeping him informed continuously about what was happening to Mion. That agent faked to be detached not to generate any suspect, but in reality he was controlling everything. And he had revealed to Goemon that one of the boys was going to die in one or two days at most. Was it the kind of death Ouka had talked about? He was not sure, but it wasn't a real problem. Even if Rika had survived to him, he would have pushed them, more and more, until he would have made it. He was sure to have the whole situation under control, they would have never been able to save their own lives.

Even from there, he could hear their screams, he could taste their pain and desperation. It was the sweetest of the foods for him, the only thing which looked to be able to dull the sorrow his spirit was full of. Goemon looked out of the window, and he prided himself on the inferno he had created.

...

The basement of the Clinic in Hinamizawa was full of a surreal silence.

The cardiogram which was monitoring Giancarlo had been turned off, keeping it going was useless. Now, the room where he had been hosted was rather a mortuary chapel, and it was containing only a person alive, and a corpse.

Takano was looking at his immobile body, standing up next to the bed. She had done nothing in the whole period, during the last moments of his agony, she had just contemplated what was happening, without moving or trying to save the dying boy. She had only inactivated the device once it had shown that the one it was connected to had stopped to give any sign of life. She was alone, Irie still had to regain consciousness, the hit they had given him had been heavy and painful, and he was still fainted. He was still there, out of the room, sleeping in an uncomfortable position, but it was too heavy for the nurse to bring elsewhere, as far as she was alone.

She had done nothing, but pushing the switch which controlled the working of the cardiogram. And now, she was only looking at the grief around her, and at the one within her. She had not checked the state of Irie's head, she had not called the police, she had not informed anyone about what she had seen. She wasn't caring about it, anymore.

"This was... unavoidable." she commented, in fact "This is what occurs when you fight against something bigger than you. This is a thing I've already experienced, last year. I fought against God, against an unlimited force, and I lost. It couldn't end differently, I do think it's to be the same for whoever tries to do that. Now I know it."

She sat on the chair present in the room, the one where Alice had spent the night on. The light was vanishing from her lifeless eyes, and her movements were slow and without energy. She was tired of everything.

"You know..." she said "When I had met that girl with those little horns, she had proposed me to join them. She had said there was space for me too, in Hinamizawa. She had said that I could begin a new life here, surrounded by friends and free from the ghosts which had chased me during all these years... And I had trusted her. Really. She sounded so sincere, she had faith in what she was saying, and I could see that my happiness was important, for them. Hanyuu-chan had told it because she did believe I could have a happy time here, she had proposed that offer and I had accepted."

"But... she couldn't stand by what she had told. Nobody of them could. It's not their fault, they all did their best. The matter is that this place will never be a blessed one. They have tried to change it, and the result has been a disaster. They are all suffering, now..."

"I already knew that Hinamizawa's destiny was to be cursed, they had never been able to make me change my mind. I had got it the very first day when I came here, all those internal fights because of the Dam, a Syndrome taunting the ones it strikes... Joy couldn't rise, among these dark mountains, but for me it was neither an inconvenience, I never wished for it, after I had arrived here. Instead, I was hoping to become at least the source of this curse, the God who condemned the others to a miserable life. I was in despair, so I wanted them to be like me, and their pain would have alleviated mine... But how could I be so? The role I was aiming for is already occupied, I can see it now. The Evil which is tormenting the village, now, is something enormous, much bigger than the one I could ever create. Maybe it's not Oyashiro-sama, but there is really a force desiring a universal desperation, for all of us."

She sobbed. "A miracle will not happen... And if there is no hope for you, there is no hope for me. There is not any place here, for me."

Takano undid three of the buttons of her coat, to let her hand reach an inside pocket which she had sewed on her piece of clothing, some day before. From there, she took a gun, and a bullet. "Irie-sensei hadn't the foggiest idea about this hideout... thankfully..." Then, she laid the ball on the desk for a moment, to open the stock more easily, and after doing it she charged her weapon. She had kept it unloaded, previously, because she didn't want to take a shot accidentally, and in this way nobody had taken a chance of being harmed.

But now it was different.

Takano gave a rapid look to the door. She was still alone, nobody had reached her. She was pretty sure of it, the presence of the doctor's body next to the entrance of the room was an effective alarm system: if someone would have come down the basement he would have shouted, as soon as he had seen Irie fainted, and the intruder would have revealed his arrival. But the woman desired to be sure: she took a key from the pocket of the doctor's coat, and with it she locked the door.

Now she was like alone. She was free to do what she was going to do.

"I remember that day... Okonogi had given me a gun with a single bullet, inviting me to kill myself. I had refused, then, I didn't want to give up to such a destiny... but my shot in the end had hurt nobody. The ball had ended inside a tree, forming a deep hole... Poor plant, I had gone and seen it dozens of times, since that afternoon. It was the symbol of what had taken place... The memorial of that old story. Now I know that... It had to go in another way, that projectile was supposed to hit someone..."

She closed her eyes, bitterly smiling: "I think that Okonogi had given me the right suggestion, that day... The gun he had handed to me had been seized by the Banken, but after all it is not going to matter, this world is full of weapons... The past pain, and the present one, the one I had suffered, and the one they had... It's too much. My mere existence is the cause of everything... the despicable God who had created me assigned to me a hideous life, and I can't bear with it a day more..."

"I am tired, Hanyuu-chan... Sorry if I can't fulfill what I've promised to you... I am sorry for everything, it's all my fault..."

Takano sat on the bed where Giancarlo's body was, and she said: "Won't you mind if I do it here, will you? I am too tired even to go elsewhere..."

She put the barrel of the gun inside her mouth.

Her eyes were watering... And suddenly, a vision appeared in front of him.

"Grandpa..." His spirit was there, holding out his hand to her. They would have lived together, far from all the sorrow she had dealt with in all her life... Finally...

Takano smiled, while crying like a little girl who had found again her parents. It was like her heart had just melting, she was not feeling her body, her anguish was vanishing. Her soul was flying away from her body. Together with his grandfather, she would have lived the dream she had always wished.

And then, she pulled off the trigger.

...

Some kilometer far from the Clinic, the man who had kidnapped Mion hadn't had the time to run away with his booty. Two other people had reached the place where he had fought against Alice.

Satoko and Satoshi had been contacted by Rena. The brown-haired girl was still inside the building because of her state of health, she had been there for a lot of time by that moment, but finally that day was to be the last one she had to stay there, her father was about to take and bring her at home. So, Irie had told her he would have come to her room very early in the morning to do a final checkup, after visiting Mion and Giancarlo. And his lateness was the thing which had aroused her suspicions. She was having a bad presage, so she had taken her wheelchair, and she had gone to the window of her room, to look outside. And there, she had seen Mion while being moved away, and Alice while looking for the man and her. She had realized immediately what had happened, so she flung herself to the reception hall, and since there were not doctors, nurses or employees yet she directly called the police.

After doing that, she realized that neither Irie nor Takano were present inside the various halls or anywhere on the main floor, and she got worried for them, too, but she quickly concluded she couldn't reach them. She was conscious they were probably at the basement, that unknown was carrying Mion's body and so he had likely assailed them not far from her room, but she couldn't go downstairs, now she was just not able to walk. Furthermore, from the lower floor they would have never listened to her voice, they were too far, and the walls of environment were sound-proof. Finally, there was nobody to send down to check the situation, Irie had come very early that morning, to give a look at the two young ills, and so there was not any member of the staff yet, they were going to come only in half an hour. And the few patients who had arrived until that moment were very old men, people driven there by their sons and nephews who had afterwards gone away to work. They barely could stand up. They were helpless individuals, just like her.

Cursing herself for not being able to help Irie or Takano, Rena concluded then that the only thing she could do for him was waiting for other doctors or nurses. Maybe they would have come earlier than usual, but she was aware that even in the most lucky case her waiting would have been at least fifteen-twenty minutes long: the rest of the staff had never arrived in good time during her stay at the Clinic, and there was no reason to think that day was unlike the others. It was a pity than the sensei was used to arrive so early, so much time before the others, that man would have had less time to perform his plan.

But, at least, there was something else Rena could still do for Mion and Alice. That man was going far from the Clinic through the wood, a zone that maybe Satoko had filled with traps. The blond-haired girl knew very well the zone, and her intervention would have been decisive. Simply, she had not to stay alone, but luckily her brother was with her. And so, she decided to call them, concisely informing them about what had happened, and begging them to give a hand to Alice.

That's why they were there. Satoshi had made a beeline for the ones they had heard fighting, and Satoko came just some second after him. But when they had arrived there, they had seen it was over. Alice was lying on the ground, dead, in the middle of a bloody pool.

"Ali-chan..." said Satoko, while realizing they had arrived too late. But it was not the moment to be sorry for her friend. The one who had realistically killed her was in front of them. Carrying Mion's body hadn't allowed him to run fast, and he hadn't had time enough to go away not being seen.

"Damn..." the man only commented.

"You, don't move! Hold still!" yelled Satoshi.

"And what if I defy?"

"The matter is not whether obeying or not" exclaimed Satoko "Simply you have no choice. While Nii-Nii was arriving here and distracting you, I lingered to go not far from here, and to deflate the tires of your car. You can't go anywhere, now."

Their enemy looked at them, coldly. "You have decided not to head directly for here, then... So, don't you think that your friend might be still with you, if you had come here at once without making any detour?"

The man's acid comment hushed Satoko, who lowered the eyes sorry. But Satoshi came to her defense: "Don't charge Satoko of something you have done, now! She ran as fast as she could, but she would have arrived after me, anyways. There was no way she could prevent this from happening."

Satoko hugged her brother, grateful.

"Yes, probably you're right." the other replied "Still, you can see I'm not joking, here. I am not here for fun. Let me go and don't hinder me, or your destiny will be like this girl's one."

"You already know the answer to this absurd invitation." told Satoko.

"...Yes, I think so. It's something I wouldn't like to do, but you're obliging me." Another time, he was compelled to lean Mion on the grass, but this time he put his knife back into its case, and he took Alice's sword which was not far from there. He lifted it as with a certain shape of respect, it had belonged to an honorable enemy; but at the same time, it was a longer weapon than his dagger, one which could cause deadly wounds more easily, and it would have allowed him to end this story more quickly. Moreover, the others looked unarmed.

Satoko, as for her, was trying instead to get what they could do against him. Unfortunately, their opponent had not run into any trap, because there was not any of them, there. She hadn't mined the area around the Clinic, because she feared to harm some of its patients. And even if there had been some, their opponent looked someone with great experience, a fighter strong like a samurai coming from past times, and he would have dodged them with mastery. Furthermore, she had no possibility to prepare new ones, and Keiichi, Rika, Hanyuu and the Sonozakis, which had probably been called by Rena too, would have joined them much later, because they didn't know the zone as well as she could. Their friends couldn't know it, but in the whole area there was only a place where they could hide a way of transport to escape with, and so she had been able to conduct her brother there very quickly, unlike what the other could. They were about to help them only in quite a long time.

But they still kept a chance. She knew that Satoshi would have protected her, offering to fight against him even if he feared to be forced to do it bare-handed, but he was not aware of the fact his sister did carry a weapon, with them. One of her last experiments, which she had taken from a drawer before leaving, suspecting that it would have turned out precious, but which she hadn't fully tested yet. But there was no time for hesitations and doubts.

"Nii-Nii, please wear this."

In her hands, she was holding a gauntlet, made-to-measure for Satoshi's right hand.

"A... glove? Why...?"

"Please do it at once! It's our only resource, now. If we win, it will be thanks to this."

…

As Satoko had guessed, Rena had phoned to all to raise the alarm. But she couldn't know that she hadn't been able to talk with everyone. Nobody had answered, from the Furudes' house. Rika's heart was aching excruciatingly, and she had asked Hanyuu not to take the receiver. Talking with them was useless, she was realizing that her time had come.

"Rika, please no!" shouted Hanyuu "Please, hang on!"

"You... ugh... You already know I can't do anything about it. This damn spiritual orb... It's going to... To... The pain is getting unbearable... So..." Rika violently coughed, and with that some blood came out of her mouth.

"Rika... Rika..." Hanyuu was keeping on crying, getting desperate for not being able to help her descendant, in addition to cleaning her face. "I'm sorry not to have the ability to make you travel back in time again, I would immediate activate it if I could. But my powers has got so weak, during all these centuries, after all the times we had to have recourse to them... I'm sorry, Rika, I'm helpless..."

"Please... don't bore me with these nonsenses." replied the blue-haired girl, floundering "Hearing you while you're blathering these falsities is making this moment even more painful than what it already is... However... This ache... This means that Gi-chan has finally dead... I'm sorry for him, really... But the truth is that I am sorry for all of us. Is... Is this the end of all?" Rika was feeling like dying. What Ouka had placed in her body had come into action, since the conditions necessary for its activation had definitely occurred, and now it was mangling her heart, which was beating wildly. Rika was sweating, her eyes and her mouth were wide open, veins and dark spots were standing out on her tiny arms. She was feeling like her whole body was rigidifying...

She had nearly forgotten that kind of pain. Her body had been disemboweled in so many cursed worlds, but by now she hoped it belonged to the past. Still, she hadn't stopped to feel like being sarcastic "Maybe... this is what people live during heart failures... Or when they fall in love. It's instructive."

"Please don't kid, Rika, at least not in this moment!"

"What... should I do, then...? Give me... the permission to face my end with dignity..." Rika closed her eyes.

"Don't be this mean! Take heart, resist, we will find a way to make it! Don't you agree, Rika?"

Rika didn't answer.

"Rika, I've told you not to joke! Please, try to understand me, it's a hard moment for me, too, so don't make me feel worse than necessary!"

Rika didn't answer.

"Please, answer me! Tell me something!"

Hanyuu was going on speaking with her, pressing her to reply, but she was beginning to realize it.

"Rika? Rika, Rika, Rikaaa! Rika, tell me something! You can't do this to us! Rika..."

Rika didn't answer, because she couldn't. Her heart had ceased beating.

"Rika... Ri... ka... RIKAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!"


	51. -

**51  
**

___Nii-chan, it's me..._

___Please listen to me. I know you can do it._

___There is a final thing I can do for you. _

___The day when we have been born, you have saved my life. Do you remember it? I was dead, that day, before I began to cry. The doctors around us couldn't tell what had happened to me, so there couldn't be a rational explanation. If there was, they would have found it then, am I right? But so, the only one I could give to myself was your presence. My soul was leaving my little dead body, but you had dragged it back. _

___I have never been sure whether it has been good or not. There have been lots of cold days when I desired to have never come into light, there have been lots of dark nights when I desired to die... But... You were there, with our relatives, and with my boyfriend Alberto. Without you, my existence would have been a living hell._

___I really can't understand how all of you were able to do it. Was it because of what we have been told when we were very little... About our Sympathiae Sanguis? I've never believed in it, honestly. But in the end you wanted me to be happy, just like I wanted you to be. I was desiring it so much that I started to clutch at every single grain of hope._

___And so, when I fought against that man... I hoped not to be an ordinary girl. I wished to have some special power, I wanted to save everyone. It was enough to stop him until the others arrived, and I made it... But when I reached my purpose my will had like vanished, and this had been my end. _

___I know I am a little strange, but I was not that sad, while I was passing away. It can sound absurd, but the day of my death has been the happiest in my whole life. I had proven not to be junk._

___But did this imply that I was really a person with mighty powers? Was I a super-woman? I fear not. If I had been such a person, I would have been like an invincible Goddess. And instead I lost. Nobody can't be such a being. I can't, you can't, our friends can't._

___But this means that neither our enemies can._

___That's why I can't allow you to follow me. _

___I was a normal girl. I was nothing special, on the contrary... I had been weak, during all these years... But I have been able to be strong, at least today. And if I could do it, you can, too._

___I want you to stay down there, with the others. We will meet each other when you come back in front of God, but not now._

___It will be our personal miracle. The others have told us lots of times that a miracle happens, if you desire it with all your inner might and main. It's so highly improbable, like winning a million times at heads or tails, though it's not impossible... But at the same time I know that you wished not to live, before falling fainted, prey of your sorrow... I'm aware of what you have done that day, to Mii-chan... And I understand your feelings, your regrets._

___Though, I am sure you want to live, deep-down. That you want to live, and be happy._

___I know it. I know you. I was your sister. _

___That's why I'm going to desire it with all myself. My only will... It will be enough for the both of us._

___Because I want it... It's going to be my greatest wish. My last one, the one which will make me truly happy._

___Because in all these years you took on my sins and my sorrow... Now I will take on your hopes._

___My will will take yours by the hand, it will make it strong and powerful, and it will guide you. _

___I will bring you back. _

___And once I do it, we will be forced to part and go through different paths._

___You on this earth, I elsewhere. _

___And so, please, wake up. Show to everyone what you can really do.  
_

___Wake up._

___Please, wake up.  
_

___Wake up, and good luck, Nii-chan._


	52. In memory

**52 – In memory**

_Hinamizawa, 29th February 1984_

Satoshi quickly wore the glove, as Satoko had asked for him to do. It was quite a heavy one but, in spite of this, on the back he was feeling strangely cold. There was something metallic, like a sort of little box, in that part of the gauntlet... It didn't look a normal garment. But he wasn't getting the sense of having it on his hand. The other one was carrying a sword, namely Alice's one, while on the contrary he was kind of unarmed.

"What must I do, with this? He's charging me!" exclaimed Satoshi.

"Nii-Nii, hurry up! Imagine to have a ball in your hand and to be a pitcher! Throw the ball, and hit him!"

"What?"

"Please, now! Or do you prefer to be killed?"

Satoshi obeyed, and he clenched his right hand, as if he was holding an object. And magically he had the impression that something really appeared in it, even if he couldn't see it because of the closed fist. It was a little object, but strangely heavy, considering its size. What genre of contraption had his sister prepared? He would have asked her, now at least her words were making sense, there looked to be something to launch, indeed; moreover, even if he wasn't a great pitcher at all and the other was thirty meters far, his target was bigger than a mitt, so it was not easy to miss it. He wound up his arm, and he threw.

A little black sphere exited from his hand. Where did it come from? It looked a black pearl slightly bigger than the usual ones you can see at the jeweler's, vivid and bright. And moreover, it produced a strange noise... The little ball seemed to let out a myriad of little gas bubbles, like a pill of aspirin sinking in a glass full of water. And so, it seemed to change color, it was lightening...

The other man wasn't scared by it. He could easily see the sphere coming towards him, it hadn't been shot by a gun and it wasn't that fast. So, he promptly drew the sword and he placed it to a vertical position, aiming at splitting the ball into two perfectly equal parts, as if it was a normal projectile. And with a dexterous move he was able to intercept it, hitting it in the middle.

But this was what Satoko was expecting. When the ball came into contact with the blade, a burst of flame suddenly turned up from the sphere, and he ran over its target who was forced to back off and kneel because of it.

"What..." he asked, recovering from the shock.

"Human minds are so strange, sometimes. Did you think I was such a naïve girl? I am not so ingenuous to use normal marbles against you, now. By the way, it would have reacted also if it had hit you body instead of "your" sword, or even if it had ended to the ground... So, dodging it or not is absolutely useless, man."

"Pretty nice." commented Satoshi "So I neither need to be so too precise... But how does it works? Are there other balls, here inside this gauntlet?"

"Sure! Thanks for asking me, that, I must finish to tell you how to use this." Satoko winked "Each time you clench your fist, a ball moves from a little bag on the back of the glove and it comes to the palm thanks to a tiny hole. Nii-Nii, please remember to throw it in ten seconds, once the marble is in your hand, because it's not an ordinary one. It's made of two layers, and each one deals with the oxygen in a particular one. The external one is little by little consumed, producing gas bubbles, and moreover it's easily breakable by any contact with another object; the internal one, instead, is in a liquid state and it has an immediate reaction ..."

"And it explodes with all those bursts. I see..."

Satoko nodded. That weapon was the result of a long series of experiments, maybe it would have become her true masterpiece. Originally, the external part was not consumable by air, and it was supposed only to break when it hit something. But during the first experiments it turned out to be clear that a lot of balls didn't explode because the wrapping was too thick, and making it excessively fragile was dangerous, because the whole ball could explode when it was still in the owner's hand. Making a layer which is large in the beginning and reduced in the end looked the best solution, once she had got able to put the projectiles in a vacuum-sealed bag, and the ten seconds precaution was something acceptable, even the normal hand grenades had a similar procedure.

Rather, there was another problem. Their enemy had got shocked, after that unpredictable hit, but now he was standing up again. He hadn't received significant damage. This was because Satoko feared to build a too powerful and harmful weapon, and so she had realized one which was instead a little too weak: "I guessed it would have been more effective, against living targets... I needed to make more tests... Bother." she concluded.

"I have no time to waste..." the other hissed, and he moved in to attack.

"Nii-Nii, again!" Satoshi obeyed, and a new flame hit the bodyguard, who was compelled to go back another time. He stood up at once, and he assailed them in a flash, before being countered by a new ball.

"Hey, Satoko." wondered Satoshi, when he realized the other one had stopped to study the situation "How many balls are there in this glove? They can't be infinite!"

"Yes... " she replied, in a fainted voice not to be heard by the other "This is another issue we will have to handle. Inside the glove there is a kind of sachet, a little bag from which the projectiles are taken one by one. Each of them can contain only six bullets, so the one inside the gauntlet is half-empty, now. But don't worry, I have other magazines with me."

"How many?"

"Ten, including the one you're using now."

Satoshi made a quick calculation. "So we have still fifty-seven marbles in all... and after three more shots I'll have to reload. You have to explain me how to do it."

Satoko answered excitedly. "Just open the pocket on the back, you'll see the old bag is removed automatically when you do it, and then put the new one in the same position. It's fairly easy, don't worry, I designed the gauntlet in a way that it could result user-friendly." The girl looked to think about something, then she added: "Please don't give up. My bullets seem to be less powerful than what I presumed, but we will make it. Make sure he can't approach us!"

Satoshi did what his sister begged him to do, and with a pair of hits he compelled their opponent to stay far from them. Then, once he realized there were no more bullets inside the glove, he used the small opening he had been told to eliminate the empty magazine and putting another one, given to him by Satoko. Indeed, it was similar to the sachets used for sugar, even though it was a bit larger. It fit together with its support with no problems, and it took less than two seconds for the whole operation, his sibling knew how to build good devices.

But unluckily, the other one had attended the scene, too. He had discovered that the glove needed to be reloaded after a certain amount of shots, and he would have tried to take advantage of that drawback. After all, he had currently no choice, he had to make them harmless to get Mion and go away without being disturbed again. His only chance was to go on attacking, using the sword as shield to deflect their projectiles and leaping each time backwards or to the side to avoid the flames. His aim was to be near enough to profit from the moment when the young boy could not shoot.

So, the first time Satoshi had run out of ammo, he quickly made a bolt and in no time he was next to him, ready to cut his arm with the sword. The sharp blade was coming to him, fast and implacable, and the blond-haired boy was able to avoid it only because the ground in that point had been so soft to make the man's foot sink, forcing him to slow down his assault. He had been lucky. Then, with an instinctive kick he pushed the other far from him, and he immediately reloaded.

But now? He could use six more balls, but what would have he done, once he had shot them? The bodyguard would have tried again, and he couldn't be always based on fate. ___Satoko should think about something, while I'm keeping him busy..._

In the meanwhile, four marbles had already been thrown. The other one was pressing him, hoping for some ingenuousness or anyways for some mistake by him. And now, he was coming, again. He gave his arm a wind, and he shot the fifth one, making the man go back a couple of steps.

And now? The other one was standing immobile, he was visibly waiting for him to waste the sixth and last one. And then...

"Nii-Nii, reload!" yelled suddenly Satoko, handing a new magazine, and placing it into her brother's other hand. That was a good idea, indeed, and both Satoshi and the bodyguard realized in a flash what she meant. The man sprang against him waving menacingly the sword, but the young boy was faster, and he could put the new sachet before being attacked another time. The man had to go back again, not to be run down by a new burst.

"You are not obliged to empty the old one to use a new one, Nii-Nii." commented the girl "It goes for ordinary guns, it goes for this too. And even if we've wasted a marble, it was worth our while. At least, now he has understood he can't approach us that easily."

It was becoming a strategical fighting, rather than one of pure ability. Satoshi was trying to hit him by throwing two or more bullets in a row, or waiting for profitable moments, and he had begun to make non-standard shots when he had to throw the last one of each magazine: for example he often used the sixth ball immediately after the fifth one, to make him back off further on and not to let him have time enough to attack. And he was doing so to keep him in a self-defensive position and therefore to force him to stay far from them.

As far as the other man, he was mostly waiting for the propitious moment. If they had to reload, they had carried a certain number of projectiles, and this amount couldn't be that huge. He decided to stay fifteen-twenty meters far from that couple, a safety distance to be sure to see the balls and to be certain that they couldn't hurt him more than usual. Once they had finished them, they would have been at his mercy... But at the same time, he didn't want that moment to arrive. He was feeling uneasy. Those young boys, exactly like that girl before... They were resisting strenuously, doing their best. They believe in what they were fighting for. Unlike him. He started to think to be on the wrong side, on the one of Evil. He didn't mean to be a villain, to commit horrible things... But he couldn't yield to them, without either try to withstand. His honor would have been irreparably damaged by such a behavior, he would have lost the respect of the others, as well as of himself. The only chance was to surrender to an enemy stronger than him, in this way he would have been able to stop himself... And perhaps that boy and that girl were so powerful that... An unmentionable hope had been born in his heart.

Satoshi couldn't be aware of this, obviously. Instead, he was hoping for the others to notice the noises produced by the explosions and to join them, but evidently it wouldn't have happened, this time. They would have been compelled to defeat him alone. And moreover Satoko was now squatting down, by him... He couldn't see what she was doing from there, he was too busy with the fight to pay attention to the tools next to her. She gave new marbles to him each time he needed them, but apart from that she was immobile in that position, and she wasn't either suggesting to him how and when to use the weapon she had asked for him. to use. As Trapmaster, she was surely better than him, at managing that kind of bomb launcher, while he was always doubtful about each decision and shot.

So, Satoshi couldn't comprehend what she was doing, all he could do was continuing throwing new balls, and his arm was even starting to ache: he was not used to that kind of effort, but he couldn't do otherwise. At the moment, he had still four magazines to use, and...

"Nii-Nii, after this one we have only another one left!" Satoko warned, handing a new sachet.

"What? Already?" he replied, surprised. He probably had lost count. He was sure to have reloaded five times, and to have used six groups of marbles... Not eight. Maybe it was because he would have liked to have still a lot of balls at his disposal. A sort of autosuggestion which had played a trick on him.

But then, he had only twelve bullets, and not twenty-four. He couldn't squander any of them, but the bodyguard was keeping on advancing, all those flames and hits had only slightly scorched the skin of his hand and the cloth of his coat, but he wasn't suffering particular damages, and so he still could attack with all his strength, and Satoshi had to keep him far from them, again, and again, and again... Before he could even realize it, the blond-haired boy had consumed the whole magazine, and therefore he was obliged to have recourse to the last one.

Then, he shot three more times. The other dodged two of them, and he sheltered from the third one with the aid of the sword. And so, he was free to go towards them. Before getting pleased to see Satoshi was now hesitating.

"Oh, why aren't you throwing, now? I'm coming... Or rather are you going out of ammo?" He hadn't heard what the girl had said to her brother a minute before, but now he had finally got the hang of the truth.

"S-S-Satoko, what should I do?" yelled the boy, in panic.

"It's not like you have a lot of choices, Nii-Nii" replied Satoko, still knelt "Go on hitting him, but please don't waste the last marbles."

"I will try..." he instantly shot a ball, the other one was definitely too near to them and they needed to force him back. And some second later, even the second last projectile had exited from the glove.

Satoshi didn't know what to do, now. He remembered there was a sachet with one bullet left, the one Satoko had suggested him to get rid of, to take the bodyguard by surprise... But which one was it? There were lots of them next to his feet, and he couldn't recognize the not empty one. And he couldn't lose time by searching for it, he would have been a sitting duck.

The man was running fast towards them, now, another time. He had no choice, he had to act quickly. He clenched his right hand a last time, and he shot.

Another flame appeared, and their enemy was forced to jump backwards again. But now he was grinning. He had understood it was their final ball.

"SATOKO!" exclaimed Satoshi, turning back to his sister "AND NOW WHAT CAN WE DO?"

"We can do this!" replied the girl, standing suddenly up and giving to him something.

Satoshi opened his eyes wide.

"Another... bag?"

It was a bag, indeed. A sachet like the previous ones, but one of its sides was covered by a thin coat of Plasticine.

"But... Hadn't you said that..."

"Do you think we have time for explanations? Reload, and keep the part with the Plasticine above the other. Then aim at him, and shoot, at once!"

"Roger!" he answered. Satoshi tried to put the new magazine into its support, not without some difficulty, the Plasticine had made it higher and it didn't fit perfectly the rest. Then, he turned again to his enemy, which was wading into them. He had made a prodigious jump, and he was flying towards them like an Angel of Death, looking black and terrifying to his preys because of the Sun which was right behind him. The sword he was holding was ready to put an end to their life, sparkling and shining with a sinister light on its edge. The blade was less than a meter far from Satoshi's throat, and the man was anticipating the taste of the boy's blood which was about to squirt out of his neck to his mouth... In the end, that strange hope he unconsciously had looked destined to wither...

But Satoshi had been able to place finally the new sachet, and he was ready to shoot. And so, he shot.

Another burst.

But this time, much more violent. With a painful scream, the man was flung far from them, with the right arm heavily burned. The sword flew away and it landed several meters far from them, while the flames produced by the balls were so intense that Satoshi himself took his sister and he protected her with his own body while running away.

"Are you fine?" he asked her, after a moment.

"Yes, don't worry." she answered, while her brother was helping her to stand up again "That fire is effective only if the target is very near to it. We were sufficiently enough to be safe. But now, please reload." She gave to him another bag, before running and collecting the sword. "Be careful, Nii-Nii, he still has his dagger, he's dangerous."

"It's... not true..." replied the bodyguard who, in the meanwhile, had stood up with a certain effort. "I was keeping it under the sleeve of my right arm, but now I can't say where is it, my sleeve itself doesn't exist anymore." Satoko gave a glance around, and in effect she located it not far from the place where the sword was. So, she picked it up too, and she looked at the man who was sadly smiling "I was sure you had no projectiles, and instead you preserved the most powerful ones for the ending... I was a stupid, I deserved to lose..."

"Honestly she has diddled me, too. Satoko, why had you told me I had so few marbles, when it wasn't true?"

"I didn't intend to lie... I had said it because I wanted you not to use them too quickly. I needed some time to do a thing." She took an empty bag she was keeping in one of her pockets. "Fortunately I also carried my emergency kit, here... So I borrowed two of the magazines you had, Nii-Nii."

"I see. Now I understand why the figures didn't add up, before." He looked at the group of magazines he had left on the ground, and as a matter of fact they were only nine, and not eleven. S, he had used only eight normal sets of bullets, and a special one.

"Oh, you had noticed it..." commented Satoko, raising a smile "However, with a syringe, I carefully pulled the explosive from the balls in one of them, and I injected it into the ones of the other, while keeping them inside the bag to be sure that air couldn't enter. It less hard than what you may imagine, you can use your fingers to find out where each ball is, the only important issue was to always plug the holes you create with the syringe, otherwise the balls inside would have come into contact with the oxygen of the air, and they would have exploded. That's why it was necessary for me to have as much time as possible."

"And then you've covered it with Plasticine to close all the bores."

"You got it. Ah, by the way, as you can imagine there was a lot of pressure inside each marble, after this operation, because in the same ball there is twice the usual quantity of explosive, so the increase of the effect has been much more than the mere double."

"I see... But wasn't it a bit risky, even with this kind of wrapping?"

"I was compelled to make you be in a little danger, Nii-Nii. If something had gone wrong, the gauntlet would have exploded and you would have lost your right hand... But I had to. My arms are not strong enough to throw objects at a sufficient long distance, and the glove itself was too large for me. As for you." she began to speak to the aching man "We still have five bullets like this last one, so you definitely ought to give up, or consequences will be painful, for you. If one of them reaches your head or a vital part, you'll pass away. I would have never liked to come to this point, that's not my style, but you forced me to."

"Don't worry for this, young lady" he answered "This is war, and we are soldiers. Getting wounded is something you can easily accept, from this perspective, and surrendering to a loyal and valuable enemy is not dishonorable. You've taken your revenge for that girl's death."

"Sorry, but we have not fought for that purpose." replied Satoshi. "If we wanted so, then Alice-san's death would have been paid back only by yours. But you're still alive, as you can see. Our battle made hers fundamental, but we didn't desire to... to react to this loss by spilling more blood. We're not killers like you, and like the ones you were helping."

"I see... Evidently your way of reasoning is the opposite of mine. During war, this genre of thoughts are absent, usually."

"You're talking about a warrior coming from past times." observed Satoko, while tying him with a solid rope and making sure not to cause to him too much ache at the burnt arm "But I've always thought that the old samurai were used to prefer suicide, rather than admitting a loss."

"Indeed, I should obey to my master till my death... This would be my real bushido, but... But... I am afraid of what he could be planning to do..." His deeply concerned conscience was submitting his own will, in the end.

"You'll tell us later, actually there are a lot of things we need to know."

"Well, I don't know as much as you'd like me to do, my master has always kept me in the dark, all I can say are just suspicions, and fears..."

"They will be enough. Each piece of news is fundamental, for us. But now let's go back to the Clinic, down there we'll inform the police."

"I understand..." The other's will to fight had utterly vanished, so Satoshi could even collect Mion's body, to take her back to her room, without being scared by the chance of a rebellion by their prisoner. And furthermore Satoko dared to ask: "May we know your name? I'd like to call you in a different way from a simple _you_."

"As you wish... I'm Mamiya Takeshi."

"And we are the Houjou family. Nice to meet you." Satoko couldn't explain why, but, even if they didn't share the same belief, that man emanated a halo of dignity and respect, as if he was an honorable person dragged there by the bonds with who he served, and not by his true convictions, and the girl wanted to show to appreciate it.

"I see..." Mamiya answered. And afterwards, in fact, he added: "Young lady, might I thank you?"

"And... for what?"

"Because you blocked me, by defeating me. I didn't want to fill my path with all these deaths... When I've fought against you, and against that other girl... I was feeling like I was doing the wrong thing. I had decided not to defy my master, but something inside me was saying louder and louder I had to. Despite this, I was not strong enough to stop by myself, I am too linked with my sense of... honor, and to my masters too. It's... quite absurd, a good warrior shouldn't be involved in such genre of weaknesses while he's fighting, unless he wants to die in battle. But then I needed to lose because of someone else, to make this path of madness end. An opponent strong enough to stop me. My honor is safe, I could say, and now I won't be obliged to stain my hands with more blood."

"Adults are full of contradictions, you surely know it too, don't tell yourself off for this. But then, you're regretting to have done what you have done?"

"No, this is not correct. I swore to obey to my masters as much as I could, so I'm not blaming myself due to this. I'm only saying that I didn't like very much what I was doing, and that I don't dislike that I can't do it anymore."

Neither Satoko nor Satoshi couldn't say what kind of speech that was. They couldn't remember it, but in the previous world, when Keiichi had gone to the Manor to convince Oryou to save Satoko from Teppei, the old ruler of the Sonozakis was in the same situation. The previous year, she was aware she was doing the wrong thing, by not forgiving the Houjou, but she feared to lose respect coming from the village. She wasn't sufficiently brave, she had only been able to behave like how her role compelled her to do, and therefore she needed someone who showed to be disposed to take responsibility for this. And similarly, the man in front of them, exactly like Oryou in the past, needed a person who could break these links. It was a declaration of weakness, but it was the only way to exit from that situation.

Satoko couldn't understand this, she was too young, for the moment. So, she only turned back, towards Alice's corpse. They couldn't collect her body, at the moment, Satoshi had to carry Mion, while Mamiya's burned arm didn't allow him to transport any weight. All they could do was going to the Clinic and telling about her. And then, informing their parents about what had occurred to their younger sons. Two deaths in the same period, on the same day... She knew very well what losing your loved ones means, and she was very sorry for them. Probably Flavia was to be the one who had to make that bitter phone call, and Satoko was also afraid that the sorrow provoked by the news could be so high to make the woman lose the baby she was bringing up inside her womb. Satoko hoped it wasn't about to take place, but she was conscious that it was going to be a hard period for Flavia, and for her family.

Still, there was nothing special she could do, now. So, the blond-haired girl simply caressed her friend's motionless head, delicately dressing her hair with her fingers, and cleaning her face from the drops of blood which were still dirtying it. After that, she went back and she joined the others who were going to the Irie Institute, while sadly addressing to Oyashiro-sama a prayer for her soul.

…

But bad news were not over yet, for Satoko. After arriving at the Clinic and explaining what had happened to Rena, who was there sat on her wheelchair, the young girl was told that Rika hadn't answered to the many calls she had made previously. And, of course, she was concerned about her, now. Hanyuu or she would have taken the receiver, if there wasn't a reason not to do it.

"Oh, my, this story is going to never end..." cried Satoko, spreading her arms due to her frustration.

"Rena knows that, but we can't do differently. The others are likely still in the wood, and they don't know you are at the Clinic, they still have to come here, and then you're the only ones who can go there and see what's happening there, for now. You see, Rena is pessimist today, and taking Mii-chan from here might have been only a guile to get their hands on Rika undisturbed... Don't worry, I'll say to them that you are fine, and where you've gone. At least the staff of the Clinic has arrived, and Irie-sensei has finally recovered from the unconsciousness. They told me they are going to break down the door of Gi-chan's room, they don't know why but somebody had locked it, after Mii-chan's kidnapping."

"Well... if I really have to do that... Come on, Nii-Nii, come with me to Rika's house. It's not time to walk alone through Hinamizawa, nowadays."

Satoshi obeyed, and the two of them went out of the Clinic again, hoping that at least this presage wasn't corresponding to the truth.


	53. The fifty-third card

**53 – The fifty-third card**

_Hinamizawa, 29th February 1984_

There was no door bell, next to the entrance of Rika's house. There has never been one. Hers was quite an old building, and so, to make themselves be noticed by who was inside, guests had to shout and call them, or hit vigorously the door frames, being careful not to touch the sliding structure itself which was way too fragile to bear with strong blows. Of course, in this way it was harder for the house owners to realize that someone wanted to talk with them.

So, Satoko and Satoshi yelled Rika's and Hanyuu's names several times, hoping that the absence of answer was due only to the fact the two girls could hardly hear them. They went on hitting the frames, and yelling, but nobody sounded to be there. And consequently, they began to be really worried. Maybe the house was empty, but where might have they gone? On the previous Monday, two days ago, the Principal had allowed them not to go to school for two days, but afterwards this period had been extended to the whole week because of the circumstances, so she wasn't there. When Rena had phoned to them, furthermore, it was still quite early, they couldn't have already left home at that time. And, always together with her brother, Satoko had paid a visit to the Shrine too, to control if they were there, but nobody was at the temple, and also the Saiguden was well closed. Then, they could do nothing but going back to the little house, and calling them again, uselessly.

"We should enter." proposed Satoshi "Have you still the key of the door?"

"No, I haven't" answered Satoko, disconsolate "I had preferred to give it back to her, I feared it was mean of me to keep the somebody else's keys. Here I was Rika's guest, in the end, and this is her house, not mine."

"I understand. I wouldn't like to break down the door... So let's go round the building first, to see if there are some open window or passage."

It took only a bunch of seconds to do it, but the result was not what they were hoping. All the openings were locked, like how they usually were during nights, as if nobody had opened them even after the Sun had begun to enlighten the valley. It was impossible to look inside from there, and this was making Satoko terrified. She was aware that Rika had always been an early riser, in the period when they lived together they were used to get up at dawn, to take care of the maintenance of the Shrine, or to go to school and setting some new trap for Keiichi. Her little friend was not a sleepyhead, she often woke up in the dark of night, to drink a glass of wine and look outside, melancholic... She definitely didn't like to doze, and so there was a reason, if she hadn't unlocked the windows of her house yet.

Satoko started thinking that something bad had happened to Rika. Certainly, the whole story was something that involved mainly the Sonozakis, but the blue-haired girl could be a target too. The whole club knew about her role about the Queen Carrier, and also their enemy was conscious of the Syndrome, since they had used the parasites to harm their friends. The day before, Keiichi had even wanted them to stay all together, instead of going to sleep in different buildings, but Rika had refused, she had preferred to stay alone only with Hanyuu. Satoko couldn't see why, she couldn't know that Rika's heart had already begun to ache terribly, and she didn't want them to get anguished for her.

Rika wanted not to be cause of further worries, with that choice, but in the end she had obtained the opposite effect. The blond-haired girl was now getting seriously concerned, indeed. She had to discover the truth... She yelled to her brother to knock down the entrance, and then she said aloud: "Rika, if you're here and you can't open for any reason, please stay far from the door, we're going to break it down!"

Satoshi obeyed to his sister's beg, and he took a run. But before he could reach it, the door slid slowly to the left, and a tiny figure with a known face appeared.

"Why does Satoko want to crash the door? They cost a lot of money, and she knows we aren't very rich."

A girl with blue hair was before them, smiling.

"R-Rika..."

"Yes? Why are you here? Do you need anything?"

"But w-we were afraid that something had happened to you!"

"Come on, were you fearing I was dead, now?" she looked to have fun while kidding her friend, who had got confused.

"But... These locked windows, and the fact Hanyuu-chan and you were not answering..."

"It's not an obligation to open them every morning, I just didn't want heat to go out of our bedroom... And, about the fact we hadn't heard you... We were still inside our warm beds. Today it's so unfairly cold."

She couldn't believe to that. Satoko quickly entered the house and she watched the hour on the clock on the wall. "But it's already a quarter past ten! You have never slept so much!"

"There's always a first time." Rika replied, kindly smiling "I'm sorry for making you worried about us, Satoko... Let's wait for Hanyuu, and then let's go the Clinic."

"Hanyuu-chan? Where is she?"

"On the phone... with Rena-chan, I guess. She's explaining to her why we didn't answer before." Satoshi, who had come in too, leaned out of the door which went to the other room, and he was able to notice the purple-haired girl speaking with someone. Bad and good news coming from the Clinic were making her puzzled, she didn't know whether to be happy or not, and these feelings of her were clearly observable, through her reactions and her attitude.

"You gave me quite a turn, Rika... Phew, so you're not in danger. At least you've advised Rena-chan, too, this will be a true relief for her." commented Satoko, after his brother had confirmed to her what Rika had told her. Her old roommate's behavior was absurdly unpredictable, sometimes, but she was glad to see her again, considering what they were afraid of before. Then, he waved to Hanyuu who had just stopped her conversation and who had hung up the receiver, before joining them.

The four of them were now in the little living room of the house, but they were to leave it very soon. Rika, in fact, quickly proposed: "We have to go to the Clinic. I don't want to have breakfast, I am not hungry, and I am in a hurry. There is someone I really want to have a chat with, down there."

...

The blond-haired girl regretted having left her bike at home. Rika ran all the trip from her house to the Irie Institute, and for Satoko and Hanyuu was hard to keep up the pace. She pushed the main door of the Clinic with an unusual heat, and once there she quickly located Rena, who was waiting for her, together with Daijiro and her father who in the meanwhile had arrived there in turn.

"Hi Rena, and you others. Where is he?"

No introduction, a concise and immediate question. Hanyuu had been told about what had occurred downstairs, by phone, but it hadn't been necessary to inform the others, for her. Rika was already suspecting it, that was the only possible hypothesis she could find out, in order to explain why she was still alive.

"He should be still at the basement, this morning there are lots of people there. Rena can't join them, unluckily, so she can't tell exactly what's taking place, but..."

"Thank you... I'm sorry, but I have to leave you right now. Hanyuu, Satoko, Satoshi-kun, feel free to stay here with her if you want, I have to go." Without adding anything else, she made a dart for the door which led to the basement, and in no time she reached the lower floor.

"Where was he... Yes, this must be the room..." Impetuously, she put a hand on the casing of the entrance, noticing it was strangely one with no door, and an instant later she was inside.

The ones inside turned at her, attracted by the sudden noise and by her panting breath, and so four eyes were looking at her. Next to the bed, there was a nurse which was assisting the patient. Sat right on it, instead, there was Giancarlo.

"Rika-chan... You're here." He was looking fine, just like a convalescent on the point of being discharged. "I was expecting you, honestly... I guess you want to talk, then... Please" He turned to the nurse "Could you leave us alone?"

"But Irie-sensei had recommended that I stayed here for the who..."

"Don't worry, madam" he replied politely "If that's the case I will explain everything to the doctor, later. For now, if he complains about something, just tell him that Rika-chan is here with me, he will understand."

The woman was hesitating, but the patient insisted, until she had to surrender. She exited from the room, and she made as if to close back the door, but she couldn't, since there was no door anymore, after they had knocked it down.

"It's a pity they have crashed it, I always prefer closed spaces, in this kind of moments... Sometimes I think to be actually agoraphobic." It was like he wanted to joke, but his eyes were somewhat sad and full of sorrow. Indeed, immediately after that he asked "Rika-chan, could you tell me where Nee-chan is, please? She would fly down here, if she could... But nobody has told me anything about her, even if I am going on asking."

"Honestly... I don't know..."

It was not a set phrase, she wasn't lying. Hanyuu knew it because she had spoken with Rena on the phone, but the blue-haired girl hadn't wanted to hear her, she was only focused on running and arriving at the Clinic; and once there she had gone down from the upper floor to the basement without nearly stopping, and her friend on the wheelchair hadn't had time to reveal to her what had precisely happened that morning in the forest. So, it was Satoko, who had followed her, who was obliged to say the bitter truth.

"I... I am... sorry... Gi-chan, she... she's..."

She didn't need to say anything else. Giancarlo closed his eyes, exerting not to cry, and letting out a sigh full of pain and remorse. And then he said: "This is not time for tears... But on the other hand... I... was fearing so, in reality. I was even foretelling it, I was afraid that what I thought to have lived before was the bitter truth."

"I don't understand."

"Well... While you weren't here yet, I talked with Irie-sensei. He explained to me what I had, you know, I still remember when that man came to my house and injected inside me some bizarre substance... It was... that bodyguard, the one who was with Megumi-san."

"I had imagined that." commented Rika, while Satoko exclaimed "However, that man has been captured, recently, so you don't have to be afraid of him anymore."

"Good to know... But now I was talking about something else, something I can't give any account to. Earlier, Irie-sensei told me to have quickly analyzed what the electrocardiogram had recorded... And there was something who had struck him. Before it was turned off, for more than a dozen of minutes the machine had reported that my heart hadn't been pulsing. My body couldn't resist for all that lapse of time... I... I was dead."

"R... Really?"

"That's so." he nodded "The last thing I can remember with lucidity before the moment of my awakening is an extremely painful itch under the skin of my neck..."

"So have you forgotten what happened at Mii-chan's house, and inside that cave?"

Hearing this, he opened his eyes slightly more than usual. "That is something I'd like so much to delete from my mind, but you're right, I still remember that day, that's true... Anyways, even after I had fallen unconscious, there are many other scenes which still come to my mind. But... I don't know if I am good at describing this... It was like a dream. You have a partially defined idea of what happens around you, but you can do nothing to change it, and then you think to be powerless. You are... immersed in your own body as if it is a sort of bathtub, full of water which is neither hot nor cold, you can't say it because you can't feel it. And so you're in this container, and you're unable to control it, nor to move it... That must be how Death works..."

"So you were living in a body which didn't belong to you."

"Kind of... As I've told you, I am not fully able to talk about it with precision, it was like a dream, and my mind was full of thoughts, of fears, of instinctive feelings... But I wouldn't be able to exactly tell them, now, my memory would fail me. You know, very often you have dreams, during the night, and the morning after you don't remember what you did there. You're only aware that there was one."

"So you can't say what you experienced. I can't say this is a bad thing, passing away is a step we all are destined to do, and having people who go around and say how it's supposed to be is never a good perspective. You usually pass for a demented person."

"Perhaps you're right... But there is a thing I remember very well."

"Which is?"

"I felt a grasp. A warm hand, and at the same time tenacious. It was... keeping me on this world, I am sure of it. Keeping me here, with you, until the moment I woke up. And even if I can't explain me how it was possible, I'm certain that without that anchor I would have flown away from this Earth. It was a gentle and attentive hand, a fond one, like... Nee-chan's one."

He lowered his eyes. "That's why I feared something bad had occurred to her. If that experience was somehow true, it was really her... but in order to be there within my same universe, she had likely left this one, like what I had done... So... Rika-chan, do you think it might be possible that she saved me, bringing me back to life?"

"I... can't exclude it completely..." his last words reminded to Rika what Alice had told about their birth. That day, in the girl's opinion, it was as if her brother had saved her, grabbing her arm and granting her the right to exist. And now, the opposite seemed to have taken place. Was it credible? That girl was a simple human, she wasn't Bernkastel, or one of the other witches she knew the names of. But on the other hand she had no motive to deny it, and thinking about a sister able to protect him like a guardian angel, maybe, would have alleviated Giancarlo's pain for the loss.

He was clearly sad, as a matter of fact. And Satoko, to hearten him, exclaimed: "Come on, you should be proud of yourself! You've been able to defeat the new version of the Syndrome, without any help! You have surely seen how happy the doctors and the others were, when they had seen you alive!"

He melancholically smiled: "You're wrong, I fear... To enter here, they had to break down the door... But the show in front of them didn't please them."

"What... do you intend?" asked Satoko.

Rika had a bad presentiment: "Before, you told that the cardiogram had been turned off by someone, someone who had also locked the door, I imagine... Who was here with you?"

"Takano-san was here. I don't know what was she doing here, I was still unconscious, then. But... You know, the pandemonium originated by the others who were smashing it down... It was the thing which had waken me up, like an extroverted mother who calls his son because he has to go to school..." he put a hand on his right eye, uncomforted "In that moment, I tried to get up, slowly, but I couldn't. In fact, the very first thing my eyes could see was not likable."

He made a pause, then he went on: "On my legs, there was Takano-san's body. She was dead. Her chest on my knees, her head on my stomach... Her face was like staring at me, with those wide open eyes, but the lower part of it had been torn to shreds. She had shot herself in her mouth, I could barely recognize her... And all the bed sheet was entirely bloodstained, it had become a red curtain. They had to change it, and my clothes, too. You can still see them in that corner over there, they haven't had any chance to bring them to the laundry yet."

Rika turned her gaze at them, and she contemplated them for a second. Then, she went back to listen the boy: "That wasn't a sweet awakening... The first thing I thought was_ What's happened, here?_ That scenario, and people who were trying to come in, and screaming... I was shocked, petrified by that corpse. I was frightened. It took some minute for me to calm down, once they had entered and discovered that."

"Your reaction is justifiable, Gi-chan... I suppose that her body has been brought to the mortuary of the Clinic, by now. I am sorry for her, and for Tomitake-san, too... However, I can see what you mean. People think about this kind of return to a normal life like in the case of Sleeping Beauty, hugged by rays of sunlight, surrounded by singing birds, and kissed by a lovely prince. In short, like the happiest of all the conceivable events. Your awakening, instead, has been slightly worse than this sort of Heaven, but Reality is often more cruel than every tale..."

"Rika, it's so rude of you!" cried Satoko, sincerely surprised by her friend's absence of delicacy.

"It's fine, don't worry." Giancarlo told her "It has a particular way to tell things, but she's not wrong. By the way, could you do me a favor? Before, I heard that they have brought Mii-chan not far from here. I couldn't see where they have placed her, but I am sure they were talking about her, with no door by the entrance noises are not softened, and moreover I listened to Kei-chan and Shii-chan's voices, too. So, I'd like you to have a look at her and tell me where she is exactly, and how she is. Can you do this for me, Satoko-chan?"

"Sure, no problem." The blond-haired girl left Rika and Giancarlo alone, and the two of them went on speaking.

"How do you think she is?" he asked.

"Just like how you were not a long time ago. Sleeping in a coma, and apparently destined not to wake up that soon."

He bit his lower lip. "I'd like to see her, but I fear to disturb the doctors. They are surely attending to her."

"Then why did you ask Satoko to go there? Sending her and coming in person would be the same."

"Yes... But Satoko-chan can go to Shii-chan and make her some question. Personally, instead, I don't want to meet the others, for now. I need a moment of calm, before being among them again."

"I see."

Rika was doubtful whether leaving him alone or not, but out of the blue the boy made a strange question: "Rika... Why was I able to prevent myself from hurting Mii-chan, that day?"

"She is someone special for you. That should be a sufficient reason."

"It's not. I am afraid it isn't. Irie had told me that was a strengthened version of the disease, and in the past you had explained me that the Syndrome makes you forget about your relationships with the others."

"It's not true."

"But generally it is. No matter if the ones before you are your parents, sons, partners, friends... You only wish to harm them. You want to make them suffer what you are suffering, and in the end you desire their death. So, why did I stop? It wasn't because I loved her... But... But because the vaccine inside me had started to have an effect, and only because of it. Without it, without the substance Irie had given to us before we arrived here... I... I would... I would have... Oh, my God, what I was going to make, to her..." He covered his face with his hands, beginning to cry, in the grip of the regret for what he was wishing to do that day.

Rika was staring at him. There was an idea which was forming inside her mind.

"Gi-chan, can I tell you a thing?"

"Please do." he answered, still keeping his look hidden behind his hands.

"You are doing an underlying mistake, Gi-chan. In all these years, you have always pretended that weighing yourself with all the others' responsibility was the best thing you could do. This was what had occurred, when you had decided to replace your father and become the guide of your family. But this is not right. Doing this kind of sacrifices is useless, because it doesn't solve anything, you only worry the ones who care about you. By doing everything alone, you're not making them happy, you're not protecting them, on the contrary they only get more troubled."

"But... There was nothing else I could do. My family would have been driven to desperation, if nobody had taken the lead..."

"It's not true. You could divide this burden among all of you. A task could be given to a member of the family, another task could be assigned to another person, etcetera. You would have shared the pain caused by the past, and it would have been much much lighter."

"Do you think so?" he took his hands off his face.

"Yes. Ali-chan had made your same mistake. Doing all alone and letting the others stay out of that path of sorrow is not a way to redeem yourself from the sins committed by you or by your family. It's not the only one, at least, there are many others which are way less painful. I can understand why you did it, but I can't allow you to go on so. Unlike your sister, you have still a chance to change."

"I understand... Perhaps... You're right." he concluded "I shouldn't have kept Nee-chan outside everything, I should have involved her more. Knowing nothing about the Evil didn't protect her, she was strangely so pessimist when she looked at the situation inside our family... When she talked about it, she often had been saying that she was joyful and outgoing only to cheer us up... She feared that the sorrow we had been feeling in the past was about to go on tormenting us, forever... But it's not said to be so. I know that my whole family wants to forget our great-grandfather's period... And we would have made it."

"So, in this case, you were more optimist than your sister... It's curious."

"Because I knew about the relationships within our family, better than her. Once you get used to darkness you always find it is not so dark as you were expecting."

"I agree." The hint of a smile had appeared on Rika's face. "But now, what are you planning to do? You've heard me, when you were little you had decided to sacrifice yourself for your sister's sake, but today she gave you a second chance. You are allowed to have a new life. So, what's your decision?"

"I..." he got muted, not able to find what to say.

"I was supposing that. Then I will answer for you. Your sister's greatest wish was to see you happy, right? Then, since you had decided to be responsible even for her, you have to find your way to happiness, or to a serene life, at least. This is your duty now, you must achieve her dream, to pay homage to her heroism."

"Well... It won't be easy. First of all... I will have to make a phone. I... have to tell our parents that..." He was getting sad again, but Rika leaned a hand on his.

"You will do it later, and you won't be alone. We won't let you carry this burden without our help, as I've told you before it's not the right thing to do. Before, let's eat something, rather. You surely need it. Moreover, it's nearly midday, and this morning I skipped my breakfast, so now I'm starving too." Giancarlo smiled, glad to see how she was attempting to make him relieve, even if it wasn't definitely the thing she was able to do the most.

In that moment, they heard a noise coming from the moving wheels of a couch. They both turned their heads at the entrance without the door, and from there they saw a cot with a white and large bed sheet, and a dead body hidden under it. They were likely carrying it to the mortuary, next to Takano.

"That was her, am I right?" he whispered, noticing from there that the corpse belonged to a woman approximately as tall as Alice, and closing his eyes because of the grief.

"I... I fear so. Dammit, how can they be so insensible? They should be aware that you're here and..."

"It's not a problem, don't be concerned about this, Rika-chan." He consoled her "I wanted to see her, at least for a last time. I have to arrange her funeral, you know... Bringing her whole body back to Italy or burying her far from her family would be a nonsense, I will cremate her... I suppose that there is some agency which does it, in Hinamizawa or in Okinomiya."

"Indeed, there is, but you shouldn't get dejected with these speeches..."

"I am not doing that. Death should be a passage from an earthly life to another kind of existence, shouldn't it? They have always taught me that we are going to meet our dead dears soon, and that from the afterworld they are going on protecting and guiding us... And this is what I want to believe. Alice will be always with all of us. This is not a _goodbye_, this is just a _see you soon_."

While saying it, he took away the drip from his left arm, and he stood up, to leave the room. Irie had probably warned him not to move from the bed, but Rika preferred not to block him, she knew where he was going. They both exited from there, and the blue-haired girl followed him till the entrance of the mortuary, where she stopped, and she looked at Giancarlo while he was removing the sheet which was covering Alice's corpse. He stayed immobile for a while, and then he started to caress her, saying her name in a low voice. Afterwards, he sat on her same couch and, after lifting her chest, he put her head next to his and he began to lull her, closing his eyes and smiling, like a mother with her little baby. He was singing a soft song, too, and he was touching delicately her hair, to make her long sleep sweeter and kinder.

Rika couldn't be sure, from the entrance, but she had the impression that Alice was smiling, too.

…

Rika remained there for a while, till the moment Hanyuu found her. The purple-haired girl had gone downstairs in turn and she was looking for her.

"Hanyuu" asked Rika, when she noticed her ancestor was by her "Will it be possible, for him, to be happy? Just say your point of view."

"This has been a lesson for him, surely." she answered "It was like the old worlds for the others... Living with your anguish, thinking about its causes, trying to find a better way to solve it... And keeping all of this in the bottom of his heart. There is no difference between his experience and his friends' ones, now, so he certainly has learned something important."

"Which is?"

"You should ask him for this. His path towards a happy life is still long, like everyone else's one, and it's going to last a lot of time. But the worst is over, at least for him, and I'm sure he will take to heart what has happened to him, and to her sister too. Ali-chan would be in seventh cloud, if she knew that even what she had to endure will make of him a better man, a day."

Rika preferred then to leave him alone, and to go back to the his room. If somebody had gone there, she would have explained where he was, not to cause any trouble to the staff. Most of the others were still in Mion's room, who was the one looking to be in the most serious condition. As Hanyuu said to Rika, she was still in her state of coma, and they were verifying if something else had shown up after she had been carried out of the Clinic. It might be a strain which could put under further stress her already exhausted body.

But the two girls didn't want to have a chat about her, now: "So, Hanyuu, what's really happened? Why am I still here?"

"For once, I can answer, Rika. Even the orb of energy placed by Ouka inside your body had perceived that Gi-chan had died, and it had come into action."

"So? Why am I still alive?"

"Because he's alive too. I don't know how it has been possible, but he has come back from the dead, and the orb has been forced to cancel his effects, and then it vanished."

"Is it plausible? It sounds so senseless."

"This is what has just occurred inside you, so it certainly is. It's like when you hunt rabbits with your rifle: imagine... to identify a valuable prey and to shoot at it. You effectively hit it, but when you go to get and place it into your game bag you discover it was only a piece of trunk, and you can do nothing but accepting the fact you've wasted your projectile, and the real rabbits will be free to hop everywhere."

"What a strange metaphor."

"I couldn't find anything better, on the spot. Probably the orb didn't work exactly so, it would have been better if I had talked about a bullet misfired thanks to a certain condition, but... Well, never mind. I hope at least that you've understood this won't be a menace for you anymore."

"So our friends can sacrifice themselves, now... Well, I hope they won't have to. Rather, what will happen, now? They wanted to erase Hinamizawa, Ouka had told it to us, and their plan was to rid of me with this trick..."

"We aren't sure of that, Rika. Think about it, pressing people to make that orb explode... it could work, but it's too bound up with chance, in my opinion, especially if you consider how much that Goemon-san likes realizing complicated and sophisticated plans. Leaving a relevant part of his strategy to destiny... It's not like him, if I well realized how he reasons."

"Hmmm... unless he was sure it was about to explode... In the end, pressing Mii-chan, then Rena-chan, then Gi-chan... Something had to happen, sooner or later. The part controlled by chance is littler than what you're imagining. But you might be right, we should discuss about this with the others, later."

They hadn't a lot of time. As programmed in February, the final meeting involving all the branches of the Sonozaki family was planned to take place on 5th March, in five days. That evening, the clan was to decide if Mion could go on being the ruler, or not, and by that date Rika and the others had to cook up something as soon as possible, to find a way to put their friend back on her feet, but the little girl was also aware their enemies didn't intend to stand and watch.


	54. A legal kidnapping

**54 – A legal kidnapping**

_Hinamizawa, 1st March 1984_

The day after, Rika and Hanyuu went back to the Clinic again. That afternoon, by phone, Shion had told them there were important advancements, and they would have met the whole group there at half past five. The Irie Institute was the only place suitable for an encounter, since Giancarlo was still there, convalescent.

Rika was hoping to hear finally good news. In theory the bodyguard arrested the morning before might turn out to be a precious resource for them, but she had got disconsolate when she had been told he didn't know a lot about his masters' plan. It was not strange, they were aware that keeping information hidden was vital, in case something went wrong, and then they had revealed to him only the bare minimum. The only interesting thing had been a mention about another murder, one happened in Tokyo, and involving a woman about whom he knew only the nickname _Nomura_, a label he had never heard. The bodyguard had listened to Goemon's delirium on the sly, while he was talking about an explosion which had destroyed her car and definitely fixed her. But it was only a voice, in the end, there was no evidence, it was only one's word against another, and they couldn't charge Goemon with that, at the moment.

But at least they could accuse him of being the one behind Mion's attempted kidnapping, his servant had confessed it... That was a minor violation, but sufficiently gross to put him under arrest, or if nothing else to place him in a difficult situation from which he had to defend. In fact, he was still a Sonozaki, a member of one of the most influential families of the zone, but the actual feud deprived him of that kind of protection usually unbeatable, since at the moment there was not a cohesive clan sticking up for him. And so, that early morning, Flavia had gone to their house in Okinomiya, to get him, but he had been disappeared before their arrival. Running away was an admission of guilt by him, but now they had to find him. His wife, who was alone at home, had claimed not to know where he had gone, and perhaps she was telling the truth; but she had declared also not to have anything to do with the kidnapping. This was clamorously a lie, instead, they all knew it, but unluckily the bodyguard had only told to have been sent by Goemon, he had never spoken with the woman about that operation, and this implied that substantially she didn't look to have had an effective part in it, so she was free to stay at home, at least for now. But at any rate their position had got worse, a part of their plan had gone wrong, and these were good news for Mion's party.

Anyways, while lost in these thoughts, Rika and Hanyuu had arrived at the Clinic thirty minutes before what they had agreed upon for the meeting, so they went down to the basement, after asking permission to Irie. Then, they easily reached Mion's room, and there they found her still sleeping, and Giancarlo who was holding her hand, silent.

It was like the day before. Once they had been acquainted about Alice's death, even his friends Keresanas had come to pay a visit to him. They had arrived that morning, wishing to see how he was and to hearten him, and they had seen he was passing all the time by her bedside, which was understandably human. But at the same time he wasn't saying a word, which was more unusual, since in those cases you often talk to the one who is next, to make her feel your presence, even if she can't hear or reply. The Keresanas had asked him why he wasn't at least trying to communicate with her, and he had answered: "Because I am not able to do that... I am a terrible speaker. Since my arrival to Hinamizawa, each time I opened my mouth, I caused damages... The first time I came here to the basement, I made Shii-chan cry... At the prefecture, I got more rude and aggressive than what was necessary, and I raged against Nabiha-san... At the Manor, I lacked respect towards Mii-chan, some day before even daring to attack her... Why should I speak, then? I would harm the others further on... So, the best thing I can do is warming up her hand. It's the only way left to me, to assist her..."

He was not free from his remorses, yet. And so he wanted to stay there, next to Mion, praying for her soul... But for how much time? Nobody could say when the girl was to awake. They had to drag him back inside the group, to include him in what they were doing, even only to raise his morale. But Rika couldn't do it right now, she had to wait for the others. So, since the doctor was inviting her to go up, she asked for Hanyuu to stay with their two friends, and she joined Irie.

"So? What's the matter, now?"

"Well... do you see those two men? They want to speak with you."

Rika turned at the main entrance. Indeed, there were two people, apparently motionless and waiting for something, or for someone.

"With me? What do they want of me? I'd like it's not another trap..."

"No, I don't think it's possible. They are police officers, they showed me their badge, and I even asked for confirm to their headquarters in Ibaraki, they ensured me they are not impostors."

"Ibaraki? Do they come from Ibaraki?" _Rena's old hometown... But I've never been there in my life. Why are they looking for me, instead of for her?_ Rika accepted to exit from the Clinic, and next to the door she met the two people, who were together with Kimiyoshi. Why was he there, too? She didn't dare to ask, and the four of them got into the car, which left the place.

"We are going to the police central, aren't we?" asked Rika, prudent.

"Yes, we are," answered one of the policemen "I am sorry to have disturbed you, investigations entail a lot of nuisance, for us and for citizens, too."

"I hope it will be fast."

"We're making it as fast as possible, don't worry."

"Rika-chan, you shouldn't be so nervous." observed Kimiyoshi "They're doing only their work. Please don't be so rude."

"Well... I'll try." Rika thought he wasn't wrong. Thinking more carefully about it, if they had wanted to harm or kidnap her, they would have done it while she was at home, alone with Hanyuu. From their point of view, it would have been much easier and simpler: the only problem in this event would have been Satoko's traps which were still around her house, but that was a side of the matter that those foreigners surely ignored... In other words, a spiteful person would have looked for her inside her humble and isolated house, and not at the Clinic under so many people's eyes. Moreover, Kimiyoshi was with her, and surely his family was aware of where they were going. She had to stay calm.

The blue-haired looked therefore at the crossroads before the car. That one was a road she knew very well, she was used to take it when she went to Okinomiya with her friends, and now they would were about to turn left, and in no more than twenty minutes...

Suddenly, she stood up in the car, and she splattered to the window. They had turned right.

"Hey! Where are we going?" she yelled.

"To the police station, they had already told you that." answered Kimiyoshi.

"But this is not the wrong direction! We had to take the other way, the central is inside one of Okinomiya's first buildings, just after the bridge, and..."

"Okinomiya?" replied one of the officer. "No, no, young lady, there has been a misunderstanding. We're going back to Ibaraki. That's why your tutor is coming together with you, we couldn't ever get the permission to bring a little girl alone so far from her home. He was the one who allowed us to bring you there, and even the Principal of your school have been informed. Everybody gave consent to us."

"It was my duty." concluded Kimiyoshi, smiling to his stepdaughter "After all there is no motive not to do that. We're responsible citizens, aren't we, Rika-chan?"

Rika was dumbfounded. She had never gone out of Hinamizawa and the countryside, her role forbid her to do that, and that unpredictable surprise shocked her more than anything else. Leaving it, even only for a few hours... She had never thought that the village was nearly like a cage, for her. She could never go far from it, like a criminal obliged to never set foot outside because he's under house arrest... But at the same time she had never minded it, essentially she had always loved Hinamizawa, and if it did is a prison, it was surely the best one ever possible, something more similar to cradle rather than to a jail. The only nuisance was the fact she couldn't go anywhere, on holiday, but it was a minor problem. Her ancestors had dealt with it with joy, and she had already accepted it too. She would have never left that pleasant agglomerate of hovels, it was her birthplace, and she wouldn't have exchanged it with another for all the money in the world.

She was very linked with Hinamizawa... _Maybe too much, I've nearly inured myself to it,_ she kidded herself, in a low voice. In the end, rebelling against those policemen and pretending to stay at home at all costs had more cons than pros. And however, thankfully that visit to Ibaraki was to be a very quick one, she would have been back in her beloved village very soon, she couldn't stay far from it for too long time. Some time before, talking about her move, Rena had told her there were approximately 250 kilometers, between Hinamizawa and Ibaraki, and the trip lasted usually four hours, considering the pieces of journey covered by train, and the ones by car. So, she was about to arrive not before than the late evening. Then, they might have intention to offer her to pass the night in Ibaraki, and handle the file in the following morning, but she would have decided to refuse, in this case. She would have insisted to do it immediately, she wanted to go back to Hinamizawa as soon as possible.

"Can you tell me why are going there, exactly?" she asked therefore, being still irritated.

"Well, we need your deposition for the Seohara case. And there is a couple of more trifles we must do, but it's nothing serious, don't worry."

_Seohara? The one who had been shadowing Rena?_ "You want me to give testimony? But that boy is dead, there won't be any trial, I guess."

"Yes and no. Of course, there won't be one against that boy, but that story is not completely over yet. Recently, we discovered there was someone who had protected him, during the period he had been concealed in the woods around your village."

Rika couldn't avoid to emit a sound of compartment. She knew it very well, and she knew also his identity. It was...

"This morning, a man named Sonozaki Goemon-san affirmed to have given to Seohara-san a significant assistance for his crimes, and he turned himself in. That's why your presence is required. We need a confirm to his version of events."

Rika couldn't believe to her ears.

_What's... What's happening, now? And why have they chosen me, to go to Ibaraki?_

…

While Rika was traveling to the train station, the others had arrived at the Clinic, and they had asked to Irie about her. The doctor acquainted them about the officers' visitors, and when he spelled the word _Ibaraki_ Rena tightened her lips, immediately consoled by Daijiro, thinking about what that name had meant for her during all her life and her past, both remote and recent. However, the group of boys thought it was better to call Flavia and ask her to tell them about this story. Keiichi dealt the number, a private one given to them by the woman herself due to the state of emergency, and after ten-fifteen seconds she answered. The boy explained to her what had happened, and he got shocked when she answered to know nothing about the matter.

"Are... Are you sure?" he asked.

"Of course I am. Here in this little central we quickly get aware of what is done within this walls. If the command had come from here, I would have known it."

"Wait... This was not what I meant... we already knew it you were not the responsible, they were coming from Ibaraki... But I guessed you knew about this story more than us, and you could tell us something. I thought they had informed you. I mean, if they are to come to your station with Rika-chan..."

"Unfairly they haven't. And Rika-chan has not arrived here yet. However, I'll ask to the others, maybe there is someone not in the dark, and if I have news I will phone you immediately."

Keiichi thanked her, and he hung up, telling to Irie what the inspectress had said.

"It's strange..." commented the medic "They were policemen, I couldn't be wrong... They had claimed to have phoned also to your Principal, and that he had understood the situation."

"Let's contact the Principal, then." suggested Satoko "I know his private number, it won't be a problem even if he has already left school."

"I agree, tell me what it is, please." Satoko approached the phone, and she dealt the number for Keiichi; therefore he had only to wait for the other to answer.

And once he heard a voice coming from the other end, he immediately took the floor: "Mr. Principal, this is Maebara Keiichi speaking. I'm sorry to be impolite and to skip pleasantries, but we have something very important to ask you about. Is it true that two men phoned to you to inform that they were going to bring Rika-chan to the police station?"

"... Yes, it is true." he confirmed "They had explained that for a case they had to drive her to Ibaraki. Then..."

"No, wait a second. You're saying they are not going to Okinomiya... SO ARE THEY TAKING HER TO IBARAKI?"

Listening to those words, Irie started, and everyone let out an exclamation of shock.

"Well... It's effectively so. It was important for them to have her at their disposal, they told me, so they had to bring her to that city, with her parents or with who acted in their stand. Of course, I am aware of how stressful that journey is for a little girl, but it was not like I could forbid them to do their job, and moreover they are not going to harm her, of course..."

The principal stopped speaking, he had noticed that Keiichi had already hang up. In fact, the boy had gone now far from the telephone, and now he was staring at Irie, who began to apologize, locking his eyes for the regret: "I'm sorry, really, I'm sorry... Probably they had told it to me too, but I had not understood that part..." The truth was that Irie was terribly tired, that day. In the last days he had slept for too few time, in order to try to find a cure for Mion, and for Giancarlo too, when he was still in his coma. Deep in his work, the doctor hadn't thought about resting, and now he was exhausted, and he was paying the consequences for this. The others were conscious of this, and therefore nobody dared to blame him.

Moreover, the phone started to ring. It was Flavia again. Keiichi answered, and he explained to her what they had discovered.

"I... see..." she said, when he finished "Damn, they have operated in our district without informing us, how dared they... I'll make myself heard... However, I have big news for you, too, Ibaraki is going on being on everyone's lips here, today. They have just told me that Sonozaki Goemon had been put under arrest, this morning, and he's still there, at the moment. Moreover, the officers had apprised his wife about where he is, and she instantly declared she would have gone there, too... Something big is happening, down there..."

"It smells fishy from a mile far. Thank you, mate." Keiichi stopped the conversation, and he told the situation to the others. "Guys, we have no time, we have to take quickly a choice. Rika-chan can't stay far from the village for more than 36 hours, we all know that. Somebody must go to Ibaraki as well, but we must be careful, it might be also a cheat to set us on the wrong track. We must split up, I fear. Who feels like going to Ibaraki to see how Rika-chan is and what's taking place?"

"Rena still remembers a bit about Ibaraki." said the brown-haired girl "She still knows the roads, and where the main buildings are. She should definitely go back there."

"I agree. And Daijiro and I will come with you." nodded Keiichi.

"I want to come too." protested Satoko "We're talking about Rika, I can't leave her alone!"

"I can understand your feelings, Satoko, but you can't come with us. You are much more helpful here in Hinamizawa, if somebody took advantage of the situation and he attacked us here like that other bodyguard, your traps and your way to manage them would be our sake. And the same goes for you, Hanyuu."

Hanyuu sadly nodded, while Satoko was visibly disappointed by that answer, but she didn't reply. Finally, Keiichi had got a point. Shion hugged her, to thank her for her sympathy, and then she added: "Kasai will join you, in this way the Sonozaki family will cover all the expenses, train tickets, hotel, and what have you. Please, boys, go to home and arrange your suitcases immediately, he will drive you to your houses right now."

"Very well." concluded Kasai, who was with them. "To go to the train station, I will take our van, in this way Ryuugu-san will be more at ease. And once reached our destination I will immediately contact you, Shion-san, to know if there are any news. But now, please follow me." The three boys obeyed, and they went out of the building. Satoko observed them while they were going away, and then she asked to Shion: "By the way, Nee-Nee, some minute ago you were saying you had a thing to tell us, too."

"Yes, I had... But it was not as important as this matter. However, since we must stay at Hinamizawa, I have time to recount it. But, before that, let's go downstairs, at least Gi-chan will hear it too." Satoko, Shion, Satoshi, Hanyuu and Irie reached the basement, and, once they had entered the room where Mion and Giancarlo were, each of them took a chair. Afterwards, Shion sighed, and she started to narrate:

"Kasai, yesterday, had finally found time enough to investigate about Goemon-san. Because of all the events of these days, he hadn't been able to do it yet, but finally we had a moment of respite, and we discovered something very significant. As you can imagine, even if we call him Sonozaki Goemon-san, that is not his real surname. His wife Megumi-san is the one who originally belonged to the family, instead he had decided to change his birth family name, taking on ours. In fact, before marrying our aunt he was called Hayufuki Goemon-san. It was harder than what we imagined to find this, all the existent documents about him, ID card, driving license... they only report his new acquired surname."

"And what has this to do with the rest?" asked Satoshi.

"It has a lot to do with it... When I had seen him in Kiyotsu, last week, I had the impression to have already met him somewhere... And I was right, that surname had reminded to me the truth. I had seen him several times, when I was young, I had seen his first family too... Because he actually lives in Okinomiya, but in reality he's from Hinamizawa, exactly like us."

"Really?" asked Satoko.

"Yes. I had never known him as Goemon, I had never been told his real name. But for years I've seen him as the relative of a person I knew very well. But let's tell things properly. This is going to be quite a long story, and not one with a happy ending..."

...

As Rika had imagined, the policemen were about to ask for her to stay the whole night in Ibaraki, since they had reached the city at half past nine in the evening, and then she would have gone to the police station only during the following day, but thankfully she had been able to convince the others to hasten the procedure. But even so, that evening, when they went finally over the main entrance of the headquarters of Ibaraki's law enforcement, Rika was still feeling uneasy. It was much bigger than Okinomiya's one, since its role was to protect a city hundreds of times larger than Okinomiya itself. Indeed, it was a very large building made of multiple floors, and still full of workers, despite the late hour. A forest of signs showed where each department was, and that chaos made her pump handle Kimiyoshi, who smiled at her, realizing how she was anxious. Anyways, the officers who were with her didn't need to look at the map of the palace, they already knew where they had to go: they reached an elevator, walking across the onrush of busy people, and they went up to the third floor.

Once exited from the elevator, they took the first path on the left, and they pushed a modest ordinary door. They entered a little room, where a third officer was evidently waiting for them. Without smiling, he made a nod, and with a scowl he invited the two guests to sit down on the chairs in front of the desk; then, instead of greeting them he instantly bowed to take an object. He looked the classical person who doesn't love his work, and who wants to do away with it as soon as possible, not caring about doing a good job. And this was not necessarily bad. _Good, he doesn't like to waste time, either_ Rika thought indeed, hoping for a quick issue. But her satisfaction quickly vanished, when the other man showed to have a plastic bag in his hands, and that inside it there was an object she knew very well.

It was a ceremonial knife, which was supposed to stay at the Saiguden. Why was it there, instead? She had never touched it for years, save the days when she had done stocktaking to control that nothing got missing. When she had completed the last one? In December, she remembered, and that object was still there, that day. So...

Kimiyoshi had recognized it, too. He had seen Rika's father using it sometimes in the past, when he was still alive, and its richly ornamented handle was unmistakable. He looked at the girl, and then at the officer who was still holding it.

"Why... is it here? How is it possible?" he asked.

"So you admit to have already seen this." the man replied with a grin. Then he continued "While my colleagues were guiding you here, other details have been revealed to us by the confessed criminal... No more than an hour ago, Sonozaki-san changed his deposition, and he told us that you had a little part in tormenting Seohara-san, showing this knife and menacing him. We have to verify it, but I fear it's not a totally impossible theory, because on the knife we only have found small-sized fingerprints, surely belonging to little child."

Rika turned pale. That middle-aged man was treating her coldly, caring nothing for his interlocutor's young age. But that was a minor matter... Why was he charging her with that ignominious accuse? She hadn't got surprised by the fact that Goemon had told it when she had already left Hinamizawa. If he had done it earlier, the first two policemen would have likely been forced to tell Irie or Kimiyoshi they were going to put her momentarily under arrest, or at least to detain her for a while, and they would have caused a bedlam. In this way, instead, it seemed only a request of clarification, and nobody would have minded about that.

At least, they couldn't accuse her of having stabbed Seohara. There was no blood on it, and in the end there was not that genres of wounds, when they had made the autopsy of his dead corpse. Goemon couldn't find a worse charge, but that one was already very weighty.

"And when I have done it, in his opinion?" Rika asked thoughtful.

"Sonozaki-san declared not to know it. He said to have invited you to do it when you wanted to, but he was not there to look at the scene, so he can't say the exact hour. He only is sure you really did it, because there had been remarkable effects on Seohara-san's psyche. This is his version, you can read it here, if you want." Rika didn't look at the sheet of paper he was handing, being afraid of such an answer. In this way, she was not able to give an alibi. Seohara had been untraceable for days, she couldn't claim to have been with others during the whole period, there had been plenty of moments when she was alone, and when theoretically she could have done that.

"So aren't there any adult fingerprint?" asked Kimiyoshi, incredulous.

"No. Sonozaki-san had declared to have never touched it, and that you had left it in their house in Okinomiya. And in fact this morning, around at ten o' clock, we have found the knife itself, exactly where he had told us. By the way, it was in that moment that we revealed to his wife what had become of him, and she instantly asked to come to Ibaraki to visit her husband. She must be not far from the headquarters, by now."

"But couldn't have he used gloves?" replied Kiichiro Kimiyoshi, attempting to defend Rika "In movies they always show that if you use them you don't leave them on any object."

"It's hardly possible. When you use gloves, you effectively don't leave any fingerprint, but you also remove the ones which are already present. It would be like running a duster on a dirt surface, do you understand? Instead, the small ones we have found here are well-defined, as if she had really brought it there, and nobody had handled it after that. And you'll agree with me, when I say that it's absurd to hypothesize Sonozaki-san to steal a first time the knife, torment Seohara-san with it, clean his fingerprints, give it back to Furude-san to make her leave her fingerprints on it, steal it a second time and let us find it in his house. It's too twisted, it would never work."

"And are you trusting a person who changed his version of the events? He's a liar, of course he's a liar! He told another tale to save himself!"

"I am not saying he's surely telling the truth. But his "tale" matches a lot of clues we were in possession of, so it might be reliable. Moreover, please explain me why that dagger was there, then. By just observing it, I can say this is certainly a holy object, shouldn't it be in a safe place?"

"But still..."

Rika was saying nothing. She had got an idea about why the knife was there, as priestess of the Shrine she was able to consider also the most irrational hypotheses. _Ouka..._ That day she had gone to the Saiguden not only to place that orb inside her descendant's body, but also to take it. Leaving no fingerprints was easy for a spirit... Maybe that choice was a suggestion by Goemon, having that object at their disposal could turn out to be useful, to frame her. And the fact she had done it in January, with a large advance, was also the evidence that Rika had been their real target since the very beginning, and not Mion.

"I can't believe to that!" protested Kimiyoshi, in the meantime "This theory is absurd! As her foster parent, I can't accept this charge!"

"You are free to do that. That's why I've been saying we have to verify it."

"And what if I don't realize you are dead wrong? Are you even planning to send her to a reformatory, now?"

"Please calm down, Kimiyoshi-san. Furude-san will only have to stay in Ibaraki a couple of days, in a hotel chosen by us, to let us end our inspections. Of course, it's all at the expenses of the department, for now. I am sure it won't be a problem, tomorrow is Friday and the weekend is going to start."

_Furude-san will only have to stay in Ibaraki a couple of days..._

_In Ibaraki, a couple of days..._

___A couple of days..._

For an endless moment, Rika felt like her heart had been pierced by a thousand blades. Now she had got it. It wouldn't have been hard to prove her innocence, despite what the officer had said there were no concrete elements to claim she was a dangerous girl... But for Goemon that was irrelevant. His was just a house of cards, but its purpose was to last only a few time. It would have been enough to force her to stay far from Hinamizawa for the sufficient time to drive Hinamizawa's inhabitants to the mortal madness of the Syndrome. And evidently he was ready to be sent in prison, to achieve his goal.

Moreover, Rika quickly realized she couldn't escape from Ibaraki... She was just a young girl, she had no money with her. Going back alone to Hinamizawa in 24 hours was purely inconceivable. And even if she was able to reach it by chance they would have found her quickly, they knew where to look for her, and she had no other place where she could take refuge in. They would have got her in no time, and they would have begun to have serious suspicions about her.

And finally, she couldn't rely on Kimiyoshi. He knew nothing about the Syndrome, and in his opinion staying there for two or three days was even the best choice: "Well, there isn't anything else we can do... That's fine. We will stay here for a while, and we will show that Rika did absolutely nothing."

"Very good." answered the officer, calling the two colleagues who had led them there, and asking them to bring them to their hotel.

As expected, there was only a way to save the village... Following the law, and looking for her friends, like what had occurred when they had to rescue Satoko from Teppei's clutches. She would have phoned them, once arrived at their room.

But before that...

"Please, can I ask you a favor?" she said to the inspector.

"What do you need, Furude-san?"

"I want to talk with Sonozaki Goemon-san. Here, and now."

"Why?"

"There are things I must ask him about. Ah, and I'd like you to exit from his room, after his arrival."

"I can't do that, I'm sorry. I can't leave alone a criminal and a person informed about the facts involving him."

"I understand. Then, what if you stay here to watch over us? In this case, can you request him to be accompanied up to here?"

"Well..." he reflected "If you really want, I will consent. But keep in your mind that every thing you decide to pronounce can be used against you and your parental figure."

"Don't worry about this. Please just bring him here."

Twenty minutes later, he arrived to that same room. Clearly he was still inside the palace, for his last depositions, he had not been put in jail yet. Furthermore, his face didn't belong to one who was about to become a detainee. He was smiling, rather, as if his plan had finally worked, and he was even greeting them like a good friend. _Anyways, this is really your last resort, Goemon,_ Rika thought. _I know you were hoping I died because of Ouka's orb of energy, it's enough to give a glance at your eyes to understand it..._

"Nice to meet you again." Goemon started to say, ironically "I'm glad to see you're fine. Have you met my wife? She was here, just some minute ago..."

"Goemon-san!" Kimiyoshi yelled "Why are you putting this foolish plan into action? I pretend to have an answer!"

Goemon didn't answer. Rika, from her corner, wanted him to speak as much as she could make him do. A wrong word said in the wrong moment, and she might get a priceless clue about what she could do now to wreck his plan. Still, she had to choose carefully her question, with Kimiyoshi and the officer around her, she had to avoid to speak about the Syndrome, and about many other subjects...

But suddenly, she heard a tiny soft voice.

"TIME, STOP!"

And the time froze.

Rika knew that spell, Hanyuu had used it several times. But the strange thing was that the voice was not hers, rather it belonged to another ancestor of hers.

Next to Goemon, there was Ouka.

"Well, now the other intruders won't disturb us, as you were surely wishing. Are you happy, Rika?"

"This is a true surprise. Good evening, little thief."

The spirit looked offended by that not pleasant compliment, but she didn't dare to rebut, a sign that she had been truly the one who had taken the knife. So, Rika grinned and she went on saying: "I had understood you disappeared after that day at the Saiguden, Ouka... That your powers had vanished when you focused all your energy on that damn Orb, and that after such a spell you had been obliged to leave this world..."

"Had you forgotten what I said the last time? Miracles performed by the others are what can allow me to join you here. The first time I was able to come thanks to the one you did in the war against the Yamainu..."

"...And now you did it because Gi-chan and I managed to survive, in a way. So, the role of these miracles is to give you a certain amount of energy that you can use to your taste until you consume it entirely... Now I see..." Rika sneered. "Are you going to place another Orb inside me, now?"

"No, that trick doesn't seem to be effective, on you... I want to be a mere spectator, now, I am frankly tired to fight. All I did recently was just warning my beloved friend Goemon-san that the first Orb hadn't given the expected result."

"I shouldn't have trusted you." Goemon hissed, pestered. Evidently, the link between Ouka and him allowed him to talk even in that instant.

"Our plan was perfect, you'd better not blame neither of us." the spirit replied "You had successfully forced someone of her group to sacrifice himself, and the Orb had really exploded, making Rika-chan die. Everything had gone as estimated, and only an unpredictable miracle has unluckily barred your way. Now, let's see if this remedy you've contrived really works."

"Hmph" Rika taunted Goemon "So did you confess on purpose? You won't be able to go out of it that soon. Going to jail to get rid of us... You're ready to this... _sacrifice_?" She emphasized the last word.

"I am ready to do anything, to make this story end."

"Even to die?"

"Even to die."

That answer aroused Rika's curiosity, but she had to hurry. When Hanyuu used to cast that spell, it always worked for less than a quarter-hour. It was plausible that even Ouka's one lasted for a similar lapse of time, and after its end she wouldn't have been free to ask whatever she wanted.

So, she asked him a simple thing: "Goemon-san... May you tell me who are you really, please?"

The man sighed. "They haven't narrated my story to you, then... I am slightly bewildered. I know that my face has unfairly aged, due to the sorrow I had to undergo in these years, but I was sure that people like Kimiyoshi-san had recognized me."

"He didn't. He would have told me, otherwise."

"I understand. So, Rika-chan, do you want to know the truth? If this is your desire, I will grant it, I admit to feel the need to describe my still racking pain to somebody, and finally everything has already been settled for the final battle. Now that all the pieces have been placed, there's nothing else I can do now, since I will be compelled to live in a prison for the incoming days, and nothing won't change, even if I tell you the truth. But this won't be a joyful story or a tale for kids, I'm warning you..."

* * *

**Author's note: quite a twisted and complex chapter, I hope you liked it.**

**By the way, have you heard about Higurashi's new animated series, "kaku"? I've read the plot of the light novel ****on the Animesuki forum**, it seems a return to the origin, at least this is my impression. And personally I love it. :)  



	55. The long tentacles of a remote pain

**55 – The long tentacles of a remote pain**

_Hinamizawa & Ibaraki, the past & the present  
_

"Yuzo is WHAT? Don't mock me, if this is a joke it's a bad taste one!"

A woman had turned off the TV present inside the room. She was watching a newscast talking about the Munich Massacre, occurred that same day during the Olympic Games, but now the man on the phone and she were about to be terrified by another tragedy, one involving them directly. Hayufuki Goemon, the person who had given off that scream, had been just informed about the worst thing ever happened to him in all his life, and the hand which was still holding the receiver was shuddering at what he had heard.

"I'm sorry." explained the unknown man at the other end "But half an hour ago they found two corpses, belonging to your son and to your grandchild. The officers had found the man's ID in his wallet, so there shouldn't be any chance of mistake. They had located them inside their car, which looks to have flipped and fallen from the road down to the bank of the river. The crash had been fatal, it was not possible for them to survive to such a fall, they died on the spot, without suffering."

"But where has it happened? Where the hell were they?" Goemon shouted, out of his mind.

"They had both been found not far from Yagouchi, do you know the area where the Hole is, don't you? They were next to there, it seems they were coming back, but that accident had been mortal. I'm truly sorr-"

"No more chatting! Where are they, now?"

"At the police station in Okinomiya, I suppose, they still have to make the autopsy. It's only their standard procedure, I fear they won't discover anything int-"

Goemon had interrupted the conversation, slamming the receiver on the phone.

"Damn, they were coming back... So Yuzo had even found him... This is not fair... Why wasn't I with them? Maybe that search had made him tired, and so..."

Slowly, he was realizing he had just lost the both of them. The two people he loved the most. His son Yuzo, a kind and capable man, cultured, sharp, with a shiny future in front of him... He was his father's pride... And his little grandson, who was only five, the one who filled his grandfather's days with joy and happiness...

The young kid had disappeared a pair of days before, when he was playing with his other friends by the abandoned quarry. The group of children had been driven away by a mysterious man wearing gray clothes, but nobody of them could describe him in detail, nor they were able to say where their little pal had gone. Not giving up, Goemon and his son had obstinately phoned to all of the pupils of the school, one-by-one, without overlooking anyone: he had contacted the Kimiyoshis, the Manor, the school, and all the richest and the humblest families of the village. Everyone had received a phone call in those afternoons, but nobody could give a satisfying answer to the terrified man. That was why Yuzo's only chance was to go out and look in person for him, hoping to rescue him. And he had insisted so that his father stayed at home with his wife. Goemon feared that was not a good choice, but tragically he had finally obeyed, and now he was regretting that decision.

Yuzo was his only son, and he couldn't have other ones. Goemon's first wife had died in childbirth, while bringing their heir into this world, and now he was alone: he wasn't clashing with her daughter-in-law, but he had never had a close relationship with her. She would have gone back to her parents' house, definitely leaving the Hayufukis, and she would have never met her father-in-law anymore. So, now Goemon had nobody, there were no heirs, and his surname would have died with him. For him, it was an excruciating shame.

The Hayufukis, in the past, were quite an influential family in Hinamizawa. They were not so important as the Kimiyoshis, the Furudes and the Sonozakis, but they had often had a role inside the government of the village, and before the Meiji Era there had been periods when they were greatly respected, almost like an hypothetical Fourth Great Family of the area. But after World War I, their power had quickly faded, losing out to the other families and especially to the Sonozaki clan. Goemon had attended this decadence during all his life, and thinking to be the last member of his lineage was an unbearable pain. He was likely too old to get married again and have another heir.

But on the other hand, Yuzo's death didn't convince him at all... On the driver's seat, he had always been a prudent person, he was aware of the dangers that country roads cache behind each turn, and he would have never done a risky maneuver, least of all with his little child nearby. A car accident was surely possible, but it looked strange... And moreover, when he had called them by phone, the other kids had often talked about a guy with a gray uniform... They couldn't have imagined him. Why was he up there? Who was he? Hadn't the quarry been closed for a long time? There was something he couldn't explain to himself, so he decided to go to Okinomiya's police headquarters, to know more about it.

There, he had found Oishi, who at that time hadn't retired yet. He had a talk with him, and while reading the colleagues' report, the detective alluded to a strange smell coming from the victims' car, similar to the one of sulfur. The officer had said it was quite strong... But it couldn't be: hypothesizing that Yuzo had found his son next to the quarry, and that he had inhaled the sulfur which had made him faint and lose control of his car, he would have suffered from the nausea immediately, and not after a while. They had found his car some kilometer far from Yagouchi, so he had probably driven it for some minute... And moreover Oishi had claimed there were no adults there, and the little kids had presumably invented everything. The various version of the facts showed some incompatible inconsistency, so... Something didn't work in the official reconstruction, and after the dialogue with Oishi more doubts had been inspired in him than had been solved. Unluckily, his were only remarks with no concrete clues, so he couldn't convince anyone to go on with the inquiry. Furthermore, after that dialogue he concluded that making more efforts and going on requesting to investigate would have been useless: without either expressing his condolences for the other's two sorrowful losses, that detective hadn't looked particularly disposed to help him, he seemed a braggart who looked smugly at the others, and he hadn't given a good impression to him.

Then, little by little, he had realized to be alone in that fight. Nobody looked to sincerely care for his dead relatives, and they desired to just forget everything. Young boys and girls of the village were not allowed to go to Yagouchi and to the quarry anymore, but apart from that no measures had been taken, and nobody gave support to him. Goemon felt like betrayed by his own village, and then he decided to leave Hinamizawa to live in Okinomiya, ignoring the old traditional rule which imposed _Don't join the village, don't leave the village._ He scornfully defied it, and he reached soon his new house, disregarding the others inhabitants who were suggesting him to stay and wait for his pain to pass.

In his new place of residence, he had soon met Sonozaki Megumi. They lived closed to each other, and that middle-aged woman had something in common with him, they both had left their birthplace, and they nursed a certain grudge against Hinamizawa, even if Megumi's one was much more deep and entrenched within her spirit. Goemon, rather, was more indifferent towards the village where he once had lived, and he wanted to hear about it as less as he could. However, they guessed to be similar after all, and they decided to get married. It was too late to have a baby, for them, but maybe they would have mitigate their reciprocal malaise. Goemon even changed his family name, guessing it was time to turn the page and to finally put an end to his old and glorious clan, and then he started to desire to forget everything, and to be left in peace. But destiny had other plans for him.

…

Shion's tale ended here. She didn't know a lot about the man's recent past, Kasai just couldn't discover everything about his private life, but what she had told still explained lots of things. Anyways, there was a particular Satoko wanted to be clarified.

"So Goemon-san is a relative of those two victims of the Hole... I already knew that story, we had told it once to Keiichi-san and Rena-san..."

"Indeed." replied Shion "When they phoned to our Manor, I couldn't find what to say to him, at least to console him. I remember that he had asked me about the man with a gray jacket, he had asked me to describe him, but I was not able to... That unknown in Yagouchi had scared me, and all the other kids as well, and so I had run away from that clearing, it had neither come into my mind to stop myself and stare at his ugly face to identify him... But for Goemon-san it was not a good answer, and so he had repeated the same question three, four times... I think that some other kid had talked about that detail, and he was looking for a confirm. Damn, in that period he looked far younger, and even his voice has incredibly changed, until today I had neither realized that the man who had phoned to me and Goemon-san were the same person."

"I see... But when we had told the story that other time, we were with Mion-san, and we said it was Mion-san who had gone to Yagouchi to play Hide and Seek, and it was Mion-san again who had had to speak with Goemon-san on the phone... Aren't you hiding anything from us, Nee-Nee?"

"Ehm... Yes, I admit it... That day, when we had gone to Yagouchi with Kei-chan and Rena, we had switched our roles, another time. It's funny, after all... Even if I had been obliged to wear that ridiculous black and white cosplay costume..."

"So, it was Nee-Nee who had risked to die, that day at the quarry..." Satoko said, regretful. "But then who could imagine that place was the Yamainu's base? At least they were able to arrest the murderers, but leaving them free for years had anyways been a terrible negligence."

"I should have realized it when we had fought against them." commented Shion "They were wearing identical uniforms, like the one of that other intruder at the quarry. The same jacket, the same hat... I still remember about them, I will never forget that day in Yagouchi... But frankly in that cave we were pretty busy in that moment, we were concerned about something far more pressing."

"I see. Still, I wonder what has sprung up in Goemon-san's mind, to make him hate us to this point..."

Satoko couldn't know that, but this was what the man was saying to Rika. His flashback was obviously more detailed, and it could answer to what Shion couldn't.

…

The others, in fact, couldn't be aware of the fact Goemon had known about the Yamainu for some month. Since he had changed his surname, the old important family he had belonged to had substantially disappeared, but he could still avail of a certain amount of money to invest, which allowed him, together with his new wife's considerable riches, to become quite a successful businessman. And he would have been even a better one, if after the first trip he hadn't begun to feel terribly sick. After a couple of days from his departure, his head started aching, his eyes had got red, and an overwhelming itch was tormenting him endlessly, vanishing only after his return to Okinomiya. So, he concluded he'd better stay at home and do only very short journeys, missing some good deal, but saving his health.

But even so, while talking with the various people of the sector about business, he noticed that in the financial world there was somebody who knew very well about Hinamizawa, even if they had never been in that zone of the Country before. He had been inviting them to come to Okinomiya for some bargain, and they often answered _Okinomiya? I know it, isn't it that little city not far from Hinamizawa?_ It was a nonsense, why that kind of men might be interested in a village with no potential and appeal? He couldn't guess it in that moment, but he had just made the first contact with the members of the _Tokyo_ secret organization.

For the moment, that anomalous fact pushed him to desire again to be told about what was happening in his old birthplace. It was summer, and he came to know that something strange had happened to the nurse Takano Miyo. They had seen her surrounded by a lot of strangers dressed with gray clothes, people to whom she was giving orders; and some day later they told him she had had a nervous breakdown. It was a really sudden change, and those gray uniforms, like the ones described by his grandson's friends a long time before... It was irrational, but a little suspicion was born in his mind, and therefore he decided to pay a visit to the woman, at the Irie Institute in Hinamizawa.

It was a very short talk. The nurse was now alone, without the other men all around her, as if they had abandoned her. Goemon could chat with her undisturbed, and he immediately understood that Takano's ego had got weak like a baby's one, because of the breakdown, she wouldn't have made a stand. So, all he said in that encounter was the sentence _What have you done in Yagouchi?_, and the woman quietly replied _Our headquarters? What's happened there, now?_ Goemon didn't need to know anything else, and he left her.

He had found the last responsible of Yuzo's death. After that revelation, all the nausea and the disgust he had been feeling after his son's demise had reemerged, and his spirit was now crying for justice. But that was not enough for him, then, availing of his wife's numerous contacts and powerful means, he made deeper researches, discovering a lot of things about the _Tokyo_ and the existence of the Syndrome. Those were shreds of news, he didn't know how the disease exactly worked yet, but he had found out he couldn't leave the area around Hinamizawa. That was a surprise, but it matched what had occurred to him some time before, now he had understood why he was feeling so bad, that time he had gone far from the valley... As far as he stayed in Okinomiya he was safe, but he couldn't leave the zone with impunity. So, even if that story sounded absurd he had instantly believed to it, he had personally experienced its symptoms, on the contrary of his wife who had laughed at him, inviting him not to run after his own dreams.

But then, in October, something else occurred. Megumi decided to spend a week in Ibaraki, despite her husband had asked her not to move from Okinomiya. He had told her to stay, but she didn't listen to his advice, since she wanted to stay farther from Hinamizawa and find an excuse not to go to attend Mion's advancement as new leader. She truly hated her, not less than what she did towards Oryou, and therefore he went away without her husband, who instead didn't intend to leave the place. But so, when she had come back from that city she had begun to act strangely. She was angry, she was furious. Abruptly, her desire of revenge had been awakened within her heart, and she pretended to ruin Oryou, or whoever was her heir. Nevertheless, she needed his help to do that, so she ordered him to set a good plan. He obeyed, and the result had been the Landslide Affair, and the attempt by Nabiha to humiliate Mion and Keiichi.

In that moment Goemon wasn't wishing for the destruction of the village yet. He had done everything only because his wife had ordered him to do that. Finally, he knew the true identity of the responsible of his son's death, but Takano was in such a pitiful state... She was already paying for her crime.

Still, was it what was present deep down in his heart? No, it wasn't. By thinking about that first plan, he had only followed Megumi's will without enthusiasm, but he was feeling like doing something he wasn't really interested in. He was searching for something else... for a real aim. And in December, after Nabiha's fail, the appearance of a spirit had made him realize it. It was Ouka. She had told him to have read in his spirit, and she had invited him to accept the bitter truth: not only Takano was the guilty, but also the whole village. They had not condemned the woman who had killed his only son, rather they had offered to her another chance, they were allowing her to live, walk and go around as if nothing had happened. In this way, they had shown no respect towards the past deaths. They had betrayed him, finally._ This is the truth_, Ouka had said, _and this is also what you really think. You're doing it justly, it's your right to have this certainty. Look into your heart, and you'll see it..._

Yes, that was the path to follow. Hinamizawa claimed to descend from Demons, and it was because they were aware to be the sons of Evil and Sin. They were cruel, ruthless... They were not human beings, then they didn't deserve to live, they had to be condemned as fierce criminals and monstrous creatures. That certainty, that truth he had been shown was making a sense of rage arise from the depths of his spirit... Yes, he had understood the final purpose of his life. His real self, his real emotions were awakening, after they had dozed off for all that time... In the last years he had been behaving apathetically, because he didn't know what to do; his own existence, without his son, had not a sense anymore, but now... Takano Miyo would have soon run into his revenge, but she wouldn't have been alone.

However, he concluded it was necessary to discover more. His search went on feverishly for the following days, and from time to time he visited Takano again, trying to draw out new pieces of information from her. That woman couldn't have done what she had alone, she didn't look rich enough to pay salaries for all the men they had seen next to her. But he had to prevent Irie from seeing him next to Takano. So, he usually took advantage of the moments when nobody was around her, like during lunch or while she was going back to home. It was easy to find her alone, since the members of the club were still busy with the after-effects of the Landslide Affair, and nobody else looked to want to give over some time for her; anyways, if he had been discovered and somebody had seen him next to Miyo, in case of emergency he would have made recourse to a lie, telling he was an old friend of the defunct Dr. Takano, grandfather in-law of her. The woman's colleagues, like Irie himself, might have even trusted him, since they had never seen him before and they couldn't guess who he was in reality, while the nurse would have never unmasked him, her will had already been like annihilated. Moreover, if neither Kimiyoshi had recognized him, nobody would have ever done that, he could sleep easy.

And in this way he had discovered more, like the presence of a contact between the nurse and the Tokyo, namely the woman labeled with the nickname Nomura.

And from there, he had discovered the rest. He had convinced the Tokyo to collaborate, showing them what would have happened otherwise, and then he was given the new version of the Syndrome. Ouka would have explained to him what to do, together with her he would have arranged an infallible plan, and the spirit would have helped him...

…

"I wouldn't say it was infallible." exclaimed Rika, when he finished. Everything around Goemon and her was still frozen, because of Ouka's spell, so she could speak freely, without having to be careful to what she was saying.

"It was a good plan" the other responded "And in fact it had worked. Unluckily, there will never be a totally perfect plan. The unforeseen is always waiting in ambush... Personally I have to say I was sure that the very first to die among you was about to be Mion-san, can you believe it?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well... I know what you feel, when you discover you can't protect the ones you care. It's a thing I've already experienced when Yuzo had passed away. And when you have to deal with it one, two, a thousand times... You begin to think you'd better die not to be a bother for the others. This was planned to be that girl's last thought. And then, she would have let herself die, not allowing the others to heal her. It would have been a nice sacrifice, and it would have caused also your death by means of that orb of energy."

"You fool. Mii-chan would never do such a thing."

"Are you sure? The ATPC is really an interesting substance, and Ouka had explained to me that would have been the conclusion of her sorrowful existence. Depression, then a coma, then an unconscious desire of death. An unavoidable path. Before staging all of this, I've studied her... And she belongs to the genre of people who needs a favorable wind to get some bravery and self-confidence. The more critical and hopeless your situation was, the less courage and strength she had. And once she had reached a critical point, the protein in her blood would have done the rest, and she would have never exited from her last fate." He sniggered, before taking his handkerchief, cleaning his moustache with it and going on. "So... It was funny to play with her, to make her feel like the most useless of the individuals. During all this time, it had been enough to scare her with the most terrifying scenarios and be sure not to give to her any clue about a possible solution; so, during these months she had been trying to protect the others, that brown-haired girl, that other boy, her family, her village... And she achieved no successes... Frustration and depression would have been the logical end of her life, with no chance of escaping from it. But..."

"But?"

"But something went wrong... Someone had decided to throw away his life before than her, and so evidently there have been some problem. The orb hadn't any effect, and you are still here on this earth, exactly like Mion-san."

"You said it... And it will be funny to contemplate your face, when even your last frightening hope has definitely fizzled out. What makes you think your last ploy is going to end well?"

"Should I answer?" he rebutted, derisive, before going on "Do you know? When I had talked with Takano-san, she often claimed that what had occurred was her fault. It was her fault if the others were suffering, it was her fault if she was not happy, it was her fault if there was not a cure for the Syndrome yet... That woman was truly depressed, and she was saying those phrases because of that, but she couldn't guess she was more right than what she could imagine. Without her, Yuzo would be still alive, and all of this would have never happened."

Rika was feeling sorry for her old enemy. She didn't want her to come to such a bad end, but finally the others and she hadn't been able to raise her morale and make her feel better. Takano's one was perhaps in a desperate situation, one that couldn't be solved by anyone, but Rika was however thinking to have failed, in this case.

However, they could still save their village, and so she said: "There is another thing I want to ask you. Why have you decided to devise this kind of plan? Going to jail to force me to stay far from the village... Wasn't it simpler to kidnap me?"

"It was simpler, I agree, but there were lots of motives which convinced me to choose so. First, if even this abduction had failed I would have found myself in a bad position, I wouldn't have been able to make any further move, and finally the policemen were already trailing me, I am too old to become a fugitive and the prison was anyway to be my new house, in the next period. Then, in this way you are monitored by Ibaraki's police, a huge number of officers and patrolmen, instead of keeping just one or two people by you. Moreover, in this way there won't be any march from your village, because officially nothing bad has occurred to you yet, and nobody is charging you with any accuse; namely, there isn't any excuse to protest. And finally, I don't mind about being put under arrest, if this is necessary to get the decisive win. You see, I could have kidnapped you before the beginning of all this story, maybe it would have been the most effective choice, but I wouldn't have had fun enough. I wanted all of you to suffer... to feel the fear... to live the anguish, the sense of abandonment I lived that day..."

"Phooey!" Rika exclaimed "This kind of speeches is the one I detest the most. Then why didn't you kill me, if make them watch me was such a nuisance?"

"For the same reason. Your friends surely know about the Syndrome, and if they had found you dead they would have lost hope instantly. Instead, I want to make them think they still have an infinitesimal chance, I want to see them struggling, I want to give them hell till the very end... They deserve it, they deserve the pain they're going through..."

"You... You are a monster."

"Thank you, Rika-chama."

"You're welcome." His increasing arrogance and craziness was making her angrier and angrier, but, aside from some teasing, she was striving to keep her self-control. Then she asked: "But so, are you ready to die like us? Once you are in prison, you will be probably sent far from me, and you will be destined to pass away as well, since you're from Hinamizawa, too, and the parasites are present also in your body..."

"Yes and no."

"Stop kidding me and be plain, if you want to chat with me! What do you want to say?"

"Rika-chama, what do you really know about the Syndrome? I am sure you deem that if you die, automatically every villager will follow your same destiny in 36 hours at most... But are you sure this is the truth?"

The girl looked at him dismayed, and while noticing it Goemon smiled, satisfied. "My poor little Rika-chama... do you think to be that important, now? The Great Disaster which is frightening you so much is not certain, neither with your demise. The documentation the _Tokyo_ had sent to me talks turkey, there is another necessary condition to make madness be instilled into the inhabitants of the village, which is a strong and unendurable stress. Without it, nobody would die, even if you're not alive anymore."

Rika opened her eyes wide. Irie had never told her about this detail... So, the _Tokyo_ had also made some little study on their own, likely commissioning it to another microbiologist, even to compare the different results and control Irie's trustworthiness. And so they had discovered something the medic ignored. But was it true? Was it really impossible they were wrong, and Irie was right? Could she die without causing any further tragedy and death? And could she trust Goemon, now? The most immediate answer was _No_ to each of these cases, but for the moment it was better to go on listening to him.

"Rika-chama, to put people under stress there are a lot of ways... Maybe the feud within the Sonozaki clan could turn even out to be one, and someone from one or the other side could abruptly go crazy, without my intervention... But risking and relying on fate doesn't belong to my style, I wanted to be sure there is no chance to survive for all of you. So, when I thought about choosing a proper method, I found it was nice to use also the new version of the disease, don't you agree? It matched perfectly the rest of the plan. Unlike its traditional version, the powered parasite needs to be directly injected into the circulatory system of the host organism to have some effect, but once you do it, there are no more conditions to satisfy. Ten, twenty people will soon fall prey of the new disease; and then, the others will see what happens to their friends, and they won't understand the reason of those tragic deaths. They will be terrified, they will distrust each other. And so, their level of stress will reach quickly a level sufficiently critical to... Well, you can imagine the end of this. It's a domino effect nobody can't stop. All I need is to wait for the requisite of the 36 hours to be fulfilled, and then I will unleash hell... In a flash the powered version of the parasite will beat the ones I've chosen, and gradually the standard one will come automatically into action and it will slaughter everyone, following a chain of events that you won't be able to stop, even after you've come back to Hinamizawa. Even if you're few centimetres far from them, there won't be any chance for them, the high level of strain and terror will kill them all."

Rika held her breath, she knew it was the bitter truth. In the past worlds, Keiichi, Shion, Rena... They had all gone away from the village for a certain amount of time, and after they had come home they had begun to show the final symptoms, going mad and bringing those Hinamizawa to a disaster, no matter if she was next to them or not, after their fatal period of separation. Hence, if she had gone back too late, the whole community would have died of the Syndrome, even if in the meanwhile she was there again with them. Arriving with a short delay rather than with a long one wouldn't have saved anyone.

But all she could do, for now, was going on listening to his delirium. She had to be strong, there could still be precious pieces of info she could get from him, so she asked: "That's why you needed to test the new Syndrome on Seohara-san and Gi-chan, isn't it true? That was also a way to check its real effects."

"Indeed. You're pretty smart, considering you're so young. They told me your friend looks to have survived, I wasn't expecting this... But it doesn't matter. Even if other people heal from the new disease, the old one will tear them to pieces, in any case" he burst into a devilish laugh, in the heat of the excitement.

"A young smart girl, are you saying? She isn't, frankly." observed Ouka, referring to her real spiritual age "But please go on, I didn't intend to disturb you."

"I see..." murmured Rika "But I suppose you're going to inoculate the parasite only after the famed 36 hours starting from my departure, since if you did it earlier the peak of strain would arrive too early to make the others show the final symptoms, and they wouldn't go crazy. You'll have to wait some time to do it, for now..."

"Just a little side effect of my wonderful plan. You will be blocked here for days due to the inspections made by the police, and then leaving to them an hour more or an hour less to live won't change a lot."

"You had other priorities, I imagine."

"Kind of. Of course, I took into account that you would try to use the ATPC as desperate vaccine, but... How many people will you be able to heal in time? Two hundred? One hundred? Fifty? Mion-san's blood can be transfused only a little part of the village, and even if there are survivors, their souls are condemned to be annihilated... torn out by their birthplace, far from the community they had always loved, with an uncertain future, how will their life be about to be, in your opinion? A real hell, unlike mine... Hinamizawa's spirit will cease to exist, forever..."

"Yes, I was guessing that... In fact, I really fear that after a disaster like that you would be able to survive, even if you're originally from the village you despise so much, because you would always know what will be happening, and you would never be particularly strained..."

"You're realizing it, finally... That must be what they mean, when they say that knowledge is power. I am not as fool as Takano-san, who wanted to get rid of you without grasping to have the disease inside her own body and without contriving a way not to die of it. What a stupid woman... Furthermore, I won't stay in jail for long, I just confessed a minor crime. I just admitted to have protected Seohara-san, nothing more. We're not talking about a murder, or a heavy misdeed... And the fact I still belong to an influential family like the Sonozaki clan will give me a further hand... I will be back in Okinomiya very, very soon..."

"It won't end so. You have claimed not to have said anything about the Syndrome, to your wife."

"Yes, she would have never trusted me, I know her. When I had made it be injected into the bodies of those boys, I had been compelled to tell her it was just a powerful and implacable drug... And so?"

"So, according to what we've said until now, she would be destined to die too... But you'll see when we tell her the truth, she will even help us, and you won't be able to do anything against it, since you will be still under arrest."

"I am aware she would pass away like the other villagers, she comes from Hinamizawa too, after all. But even so, she will never give heed to you. Her hatred towards Mion-san and who is her friend is blind and ferocious, she will oppose you regardless of what you want to do. And even if you tell her about the disease, she will never trust you. She hadn't done it with her husband, she won't do it with her bitter enemy..."

"But she must have thought it was strange... She can't pretend that everything is OK, if you confess a crime to the police with no obvious reasons..."

"It has been enough to tell her I was obliged to, and I did it to protect her from you. It's a bit incoherent and illogical, as excuse, but it will work, I know her very well, she has never been a sharp woman. All she needs is a further motive to hate the ones she can't bear with, and in her opinion what is said by the ones she despises is always a lie... She only believes in me, usually, and only because I've helped her in attaining her purposes... But in the end there is none so deaf as he who will not hear, don't you know that?"

"You're talking about her as if she is only a pawn for you. You have never loved her, right? Why did you got married with her, then?"

"That's not a banal question, honestly, give me a second to try to define better my relationship with her... As I had already told you, we had things in common, so it was normal to spend some time together, and personally, when I got engaged with her, I simply wanted to begin to live my life again. Maybe this might have been a good chance to help one another and forget the past, but I'd say it hadn't been so... I am not sorry for her, she's not an angel, she has never been one. She has always scorned the main branch of her own clan, the Syndrome has only exacerbated her feelings, bringing them back to light from the bottom of her heart. She will undergo what she definitely deserves, nothing more, nothing less."

"Now you like bad-mouthing her, but until now you had had fun, while using the Sonozakis' resources and contacts to discover the truth and organize your plan of revenge, hadn't you?"

"If there is long tongue in this room it doesn't belong to me... But you're right, in the end."

"Thanks for the compliments, Goemon-san. And thanks for the info too, very soon you are going to regret for having told this to me."

"And why should I? What do you think to be able to do, now? It's too late to stop me, now. Once you stay far from Hinamizawa for a period long enough, you won't be able to protect 2000 people all together from the disease, and you can't tell them not to be panic-stricken, it's something not dependent from their will... Without you and with a high level of strain, their end is near..."

"We'll see about that!"

"Time's up." exclaimed Ouka. A second later, the flow of time was unlocked, and all the others around the two contendings started back to move. And they got surprised when they heard Rika declaring_ I've nothing more to say to him_, and leaving the room, even if, from their point of view, she had told him absolutely nothing till that instant. They simply had not been able to listen to her while time was frozen.

Rika asked Kimiyoshi to exit from the central with her, she was going to go to the hotel they had talked about earlier. She was worried, she knew the other just desired to play with her, exactly like what he had done with Mion in the previous weeks. But there was a thing he seemed to have forgotten. Giancarlo had suffered from the disease and he had managed to survive... Then, maybe his organism, as answer to the new parasites, had started to produce antibodies strong enough to fight against the new Syndrome, like what occurs when you heal from measles. He could become a precious resource against Goemon's menace, and that man had hopefully not thought about that...

Unless he had, instead. Goemon was physically out of game, but he had surely prepared something. They had to stay all together, Rika was resolute not to leave anyone to his own destiny.

* * *

**Author's note: So here it is Goemon's true identity, in the end... He was the father of the man who died in Nekogoroshi-hen, while trying to rescue his son... I hope you appreciated this idea, personally I liked it, it's a way to use the old characters and not be obliged to invent new ones each time...**


	56. The last journey

**56 – The last journey  
**

_Ibaraki, 1st March 1984_

The hotel they had chosen for Rika and Kimiyoshi was not anything special, it was a little old building with only a bunch of rooms, but it was comfortable enough. The two beds present inside the one assigned to them were soft and warm, and they were inviting them to sleep; but despite the fact it was very late, neither of them was tired. Rika already knew she wouldn't have managed to sleep, that night, but there were a lot of things she could do, the first of which was phoning to someone in Hinamizawa: in the beginning, she had dealt the Meabaras' number, and Keiichi's mother had been glad to hear her, since some hour before her son had told her he was about to go to Ibaraki in turn, and only to rescue her. Her husband and she were very understanding people, they had let him leave, sure that he was doing it for a noble reason. Rika thanked her for that news, and while hanging up she reflected about what she had been revealed. Keiichi, and probably someone else, was somewhere in Ibaraki to find her... and this search was certainly coordinated. Her friends' base had to be the Manor, sure as hell, so she phoned to the Sonozakis. Shion answered, and after asking her how she was she begged Rika to tell her the exact address of the hotel where they were. She was going to say to Kasai and the others to join her immediately.

No more than fifteen minutes later, Kasai had arrived. Once arrived in that big city, the man had rented out a new van, in order to make their moves easier, and with it they had reached the hotel, guided by Shion who had sent their destination to his pager. Rika awaited them next to the entrance of the building, and afterwards they went up to their room at once. There, Kasai disconnected the ordinary phone supplied by the hotel, and he hooked up another one, looking bigger and newer than the previous one.

"What is it?" asked Rika.

"A speakerphone" explained the man, concisely "In this way we all will be allowed to talk with the ones at the other end of the line, without having to hold the receiver."

Rika had never seen one, and she showed a face of light surprise. In this way, they hadn't to speak one-by-one, and it would have been much better, she would have wasted less time. So, she instantly phoned to the Manor again, and this time it was Satoko who answered. She was still awake too, and she was there at the Sonozakis' house because Shion had told her she had been contacted by their disappeared friend, and she was waiting for further news from Ibaraki. In fact, the blond-haired girl sounded greatly relieved to hear her voice again, and it took a minute or two for Rika to make her calm and to tell her she was fine, pleading for her to stop crying. After that, she realized that Shion, Hanyuu and Satoshi and Akane were in that same room of the Manor, probably they were using a speakerphone, too. They all had been told about Goemon's past and about the reasons which were pushing him to take revenge, so they preferred to skip the subject, and they instantly started taking stock of the situation.

Shion talked first: "So, can't you come back here. Rika-chan?"

"No, for now. They are not accusing me of anything, but they said they need me for the next two or three days, I suppose they want to compare different versions of the facts, make analyses and so on."

"And can't they do it in Hinamizawa, or at least in Okinomiya?"

"Maybe, but doing it in Okinomiya would have been harder for them." replied Keiichi "They would have been obliged to bring several officers there, plus the documents of the case and the remaining necessary equipment, and moreover they would have been compelled to phone to their headquarters each time they discovered something new..."

And Satoko added: "We can't either forget they can't move Goemon-san from Ibaraki's prison, and if they had come here to Hinamizawa with Rika the confrontation between what we say and what he says would have been more difficult. Nah, from their point of view it was far far simpler to ask for Rika to go and stay round them, and once they had been given the permission, there was no problem for them."

_Indeed..._ thought Rika _They don't know a thing about the Syndrome, so they can't imagine what keeping me here means... I can't blame them, but I can't tell them the truth, now. They would never trust me._

"But maybe" Rena said "they are going to do everything tomorrow, and so they will let you leave before it's too late. Couldn't it be so? Couldn't it?"

"You're too faithful, Rena" replied Shion, disenchanted "In cases like this they always say _Don't worry, you will be free in two days_, to mollify you, and then they force you to spend there three, four, five days, always due to unexpected problems and upsetting news... Thinking she will be allowed to go away before what they have said is pure madness. However" she went one asking "Theoretically you would be allowed to go home anytime you want, wouldn't you, Rika-chan?"

"Probably..." answered Kasai, who was next to the window "Even if they are monitoring her."

"Huh?"

"There are two policemen in plain clothes who are keeping an eye on us. I've seen them while we were entering, they were in a hidden corner of the road, placed there in order to be hardly seen. However, they don't look dangerous, so I can exclude they have harmful intentions."

"Yes, Rena has seen them too. Theirs was a dark blue car" The brown-haired girl leaned her hands on the wheels of her wheelchair, and making them rotate she went to the window, by Kasai himself, observing from there the road the hotel was overlooking "Can you see it from here, Keiichi-kun? Just on the left of the entrance, that little economy car... The two men inside were constantly watching this little hotel. They are making sure Rika-chan can't go away."

"I see" answered Keiichi "So they know we are with her. Oh, well, that's nothing bad."

"Nothing bad? No, this _is _bad instead!" yelled Kimiyoshi, who didn't agree with the boy "Are they putting such a little trust in us, now? They will hear me!"

"Please calm down, Kimiyoshi-san. They might be here also to prevent anyone from kidnapping Rika-chan, in their opinion she might be seen also like a dangerous witness and..."

"They should have looked for our authorization, then! Please wait for me, it won't take a lot. I am doing this for you... but not only for you."

"What do you mean?"

"It's my fault if Mion-san stays in those conditions, in the end. I am the last responsible for Oryou-sama's death, I can't deny her heart failure had been caused by me, and I know Mion-san had got angry with me because of this. Maybe she has already forgiven me in her heart, as her grandmother had forgiven the Houjous a lot of time ago, but like Oryou-sama she won't admit it if I don't make the first step. Due to the circumstances, we hadn't a lot of time to make things clear, and personally I was even scared to do that, I was thinking it would have been a bad blow for my pride. But now I know I was wrong, and since I can do nothing for Mion-san, at the moment, the best way to atone is protecting you, and doing what I can for you. Don't worry, I will be soon back."

And the man exited from the room. Kimiyoshi-san was a good man, when all is said and done... However, Rika had never seen him behaving so impulsively, what had happened in that day had put him under stress too. But the fact he was not there anymore carried also some positive implication, now they could talk much more freely about the Syndrome and the rest. So, Rika was allowed to tell them what Goemon had revealed to her about his plans, and therefore Shion made a proposal Kimiyoshi would have never managed to understand: "Guys, why don't we ask the permission to make Rika come to home during the night and go back to Ibaraki in the following morning? For the police it would be the same, they would have her at their disposal, while for us it would be completely diverse..."

"Shii-chan, the journey from Hinamizawa to Ibaraki is too long. Even if we left this hotel right now, we wouldn't reach home before three o' clock in the night..."

"And after a short rest she would leave again, being back there by the morning. I know that keeping on traveling would be unfairly stressful for Rika-chan, but it would be a matter of only a few days, and making her stay at the village even for some minutes would be our sake, because the time passed since her last permanence in Hinamizawa would be always lower than 36 hours..."

"So you would like to make her visit the village every night, to reset this countdown..." Keiichi deduced "It's a reasonable option, but I fear it's not a good choice. From the officers' point of view, it would be an absurd request: going to our hometown, staying there for some minute and then coming back immediately... Why should a normal person desire to do it? To them, it would look like she wants to do it to make something very important at Hinamizawa, something related to this case... It would be suspicious, as if we're really hiding something, and this would make things critical. They could decide to detain her somewhere for some day, and this would be our end."

"And for the same reason" Satoko concluded "we can't make her come here in secret, like a thief in the night. If there are policemen there, they would see her immediately, and we would be forced to give some embarrassing explanation. And it's out of question to neutralize them with some trap or ambush, we would risk to be arrested, and we would play into Goemon-san's hands."

"I see... Damn, our village can't either give us a hand, organizing a march would be impossible in such a few time, bringing so many people up to here would be too hard."

"Yes, and moreover it would be useless. Goemon-san had told it to me, finally they are not charging me with any crime, so there is actually no reason to protest. It would only harm the reputation of our village, with no other effects."

"So... couldn't Shion-san use the strength of the Sonozaki family, to induce them to give her back to us?"

"She can't" retorted Akane "We are not so powerful as to affect what happens far from Hinamizawa. We are not so Great, I fear."

"And then" proposed Shion "Why don't we use an extraordinary pretext, to make her be back at once?"

"A pretext? Like what?" asked Satoshi.

The green-haired girl reflected about it, and she said: "Well... We could use... Ali-chan's funeral."

"Huh?"

The others were shaken by that grim suggestion. And also Shion couldn't do without pausing for a second, before adding: "I know it's macabre, but it's our only possibility. After all, it's true that we haven't celebrated it yet, we hadn't had time to do it. And Rika-chan is the Priest of the Shrine, so it would be her duty to conduct it..."

"Rena thinks it would be disrespectful, towards her, and towards Gi-chan too... It would be mean, trampling on their family's feelings... And moreover, it wouldn't be a good solution. Kimiyoshi-san and the Principal had given them the permission to bring her here, so starting to claim there is a funeral to say would sound strange and suspicious... And finally, once the rite has been finished, they would guide her back to Ibaraki, and we would be back to square one."

"I... see... Sorry if I used Ali-chan for this purpose, I didn't mean to lack in respect..."

"Don't worry, Shii-chan, we can understand you. But can you explain to me what this abduction has to do with the feud among the Sonozakis, the Landslide Affair, Mii-chan's kidnapping, and all the rest? If he wanted to kill all the villagers, couldn't he just bring you here, without staging all that farce?"

Rika closed her eyes. She knew that was only an emergency plan by him, because Ouka's curse had not been able to kill her. But the fact was she had never revealed to the others about Ouka herself, and about the Orb of energy she had placed inside the blue-haired girl to get rid of her. On one hand, she feared not to be trusted, although they had believed to her that summer, during the past war against the Yamainu: a spirit coming from a remote era and launching a spell on her... Their village was full of similar tales, but convincing them it was a real story was a completely different issue. On the other one, she didn't want to humiliate Hanyuu: it would have been mortifying to tell the others that her ancestor's daughter was the last responsible for all their pain and concerns, and she wanted to avoid it as far as they were not obliged to do that... In fact, since the day at the prefecture, and since the Landslide Affair, they had already understood there was an enemy to fight against; but, among all, the spirit of a relative of them was the less expected and welcome. And so, when they had run into Ouka at the Saiguden and she had declared her ill-omened will, for Hanyuu it had been a stunning shock, she couldn't believe to what she had heard. Her daughter had always been a good girl, when she was alive her aim was to build a better Hinamizawa, a village where no sacrifices were needed... But she had never shown to wish to achieve that in such an extreme and tragic manner. There was no way to imagine she turned out to be so evil and vindictive. And so, they had preferred to keep momentarily this detail secret, since making it public was like rubbing salt in the wound.

But woefully, the moment to hold nothing back had arrived. Their friends had to know everything, and even if she was at the other end of the phone, Rika could perceive that Hanyuu was nodding, to give her the courage to narrate the truth. Rika sadly sighed, and she told the whole story.

Fortunately, even though the others were disappointed by her behavior, they showed to understand why she had acted so. They knew that their little friend had always hated to make the others concerned about her: it was like during the war against Takano, when Rika had tried to hide the truth till the very last moment, claiming she was only looking for a good plot for her manga and admitting the reality only when she couldn't do otherwise.

"Well, I'd say that people never change completely..." exclaimed Keiichi "There is a part of you which is always the same, no matter what happens."

"I'm sorry..."

"Don't worry, it goes for everyone, not just for you. And moreover... I don't remember who said this... But people have not necessarily to know everything about their friends."

"Do you believe so?"

"Sure! We don't need friends who want to discover every detail of our life, as if we are not reliable people... If these people don't either trust us a bit, what kind of friends would be they?"

"I must have heard about this too, somewhere." added Satoko "I wonder who was the author of this adage..."

"Hauuu, Rena has never listened to this! Why is Rena always so unlucky? Why?"

They were not discussing whether her story was true or false... They had immediately accepted it as reality, without questioning it. Her old good friends had clearly trusted her, and Rika was glad to realize it.

"Well" concluded Keiichi, taking back the thread of the conversation "Now I understand tons of things... This plan by Goemon-san is apparently a fallback choice, an option to use only in case Rika-chan had not died because of it... And moreover, I get also why he put it into practice in such a rush... For him, there are only a few days left to complete his revenge."

"Really?"

"Yes, it must be so" Satoko went on "And Goemon-san hadn't told you this particular, I bet."

"Yes... you're right."

"Obviously, Rika-chan. Tonight at the central he wanted to scare you, but this part of the story would have generated the opposite effect... The truth is that man has used his wife's crusade as excuse, as screen to cover his real plan. But since the final meeting among the members of the Sonozaki clan had been scheduled on the 5th of this month, after this date the feud will be anyway over, and then he would be obliged to act in the open air. Megumi-san is far more villain than Keiichi-san, but she would immediately discover that her husband's intentions are not what she was thinking before, and in a flash he would find himself alone, with very poor chances to succeed, if not without any chance at all."

"Rena gets it. If he was in a hurry, this last trick will probably have some chink, and we must take advantage of them, is Rena right, is she?"

"Yes, you are." answered Keiichi "We can win, we can do it."

"But what is the gap of his plan?" asked Shion.

"Uhm... Here comes the hardest part... I fear we have only one way to make it."

"Which is?"

"Demonstrating that Rika is completely extraneous to these facts, proving that the verifications are not necessary, and asking them to allow her to go home immediately."

"Namely we are going to follow the law... OK, I have not anything against it, but how can we do this in just a day? What are you suggesting?"

"We must have a chat with the head of the inquiry, I fear that his subordinates would never let her go. Those pusillanimous policemen would entrench themselves behind sentences like _I've not the power to do this, This is an order and I'm only obeying, I can't take responsibility for this_... Nah, it's much better to deal with the core of the problem at once. Do you know who is the boss, there?"

"Well..." whispered Rika "We asked for it, while we were still in their headquarters. Or better, Kimiyoshi-san did it, I was personally lost in my thoughts... And then he had been told the main responsible of the inquiry is... Ibaraki's Police commissioner in person."

"Whoa! He's not just anyone..."

"Seohara-san's case had had a great prominence even in a city big like this, it's about four young people's deaths, so there had been a considerable deployment of forces, by them, and their chief had directly took the reins of the investigations."

"And still, it was us who solved the situation, finding out the truth... Well, nevermind. Rika-chan, have you already talked with him? It would be nice to know what kind of person he is, to decide the better strategy to follow."

"No, regrettably. They had told us he was absent, and that he wasn't about to be in Ibaraki before tomorrow in the evening."

"Quite inconvenient." commented Shion "But are sure this is not a lie invented to keep us far from him? I wouldn't like the commissioner belongs to the kind of people who hates to give explanations and thinks to be superior than anyone else."

But her mother reprimanded her: "No, they were telling the truth. Today even Okinomiya's prefect had gone to Tokyo for an encounter between public officials, and he will be at home tomorrow, too."

"So Ibaraki's chief of police will be reachable only tomorrow evening... But then he will likely stay at home tomorrow, and he will go to work only the day after... It will be too late for us!"

"Maybe not." replied Rika "I was absent-minded while Kimiyoshi was asking for where the commissioner was, but I remember he had been given a little yellow sheet of paper, they had handled it to him to answer to that question. I suppose it's something about him..." She stood up, and she fumbled in the pockets of Kimiyoshi's coat, which had been left on his bed.

"Here it is." she exclaimed, when she found it "A little flier talking about a party where a lot of authorities had been invited..."

"I guess the chief of police will be there, too. Where and when..."

"Tomorrow at 9:00 PM, at Ibaraki's Great Conference Hall. Do you really want to participate, Kei-chan?"

"It's our only chance to tell him our question, I am afraid... Considering our time limits, Rika-chan must leave Ibaraki before tomorrow's midnight, otherwise it will be a tragedy. We must ask for someone to check when the last train of the day leaves from here... But still, the most urgent problem is to find a way to sneak in that party, and meet that man."

"Oh, Maebara-kun..." exclaimed Akane "A minute ago you were overestimating us, now you're doing the opposite... The Sonozakis may be not strong enough to make the course of law change in Ibaraki, but we are influential enough to be present at a party like that, especially if it's not a reserved one. And I'd say this is the case, they wouldn't give fliers to anyone otherwise."

"So? Will you be able to ensure we will all be invited?"

"Certainly. Let my husband and I do it, you won't regret it."

"Very good. It's going to be rude of us to disturb a pleasant event like that, but this is literally a matter of life and death. However, at least we need our most formal outfit, we can't attend such an élite event with the clothes we're wearing now."

"Then we will send someone to bring them to you. We will advise your parents, and they will arrange your suitcases."

"Well..." noticed Satoko "As for me and Nii-Nii, I am not sure we have proper clothes..."

"Oh, about that... I will take of this." Shion comforted her "We have dozens of unused outfits inside our wardrobes, we will find something suitable for you. But, if you prefer, we can ask Irie-sensei, too. He will surely be very happy to lend you that maid uniform he had bought some time ago..."

"God, please no! I am tired to withstand that pervert's tortures!" The others laughed for that exclamation, and a smile appeared even on Rika's face, hearing how her friends were trying to raise each other's morale.

"Well, we've set it!" concluded Keiichi, exploiting that moment of relieve "Tomorrow we will accompany Rika-chan to the central, since I suppose she's going to stay there the whole day or thereabouts. And once we are there we will try to convince the commissioner's subordinates that keeping her here is wrong; I fear we won't be able to do it, but I don't want to leave any stone unturned. Then, we will go all together at the Conference Hall, and this time they will be forced to give heed to us!"

"Who's going to bring all our things?" asked Rena.

"Well... I was thinking we'd all better go to Ibaraki with you. Megumi-san is there too, it's plain that they are investing all their efforts there, and not here in Hinamizawa. If they are preparing something, they are doing it in that big city."

"Are you sure, Shii-chan?"

"Kind of. The only ways to destroy Hinamizawa's population quickly are taking Rika-chan's life or keeping her far from her own village, and in both of these cases they have to make it in Ibaraki, since she is there, actually. I don't think this is a diversion, we've already concluded that Goemon-san hadn't had a lot of time to cook up something more articulate. Of course, I can't be completely sure about this, but it's a risk we must run, the more we are in Ibaraki, the better."

"So are you going to come here all together?"

"Shouldn't we, Kei-chan? We can't leave you in the middle of this danger!"

_It's nice to see how we are so united and strong,_ Rika thought._ Even in this moment, we are all desiring to help each other..._

But they were all desiring it, really? A doubt had been born in her mind, and it reminded her what she had reflected about earlier. Maybe Goemon-san had calculated everything, and this time they couldn't afford any mistake... They couldn't afford to leave anyone alone. So she asked: "So, is everyone coming here?"

"Yes, Rika-chan. It's what we've just told you."

"Nobody excluded? Neither Gi-chan?"

Shion didn't answer, and Rena said: "Why are you asking for him, Rika-chan?"

"Because he isn't with the others at the Manor, at least I have not heard his voice yet. Is he still at the Clinic?"

"I... I think so." answered Satoko.

Rika's mind returned to what had occurred in the previous days. I_ can imagine how he's feeling like... I am sure he has spent all his time next to Mii-chan, keeping her hand in his to warm it... He still holds against himself due to what he has done to her, he has not forgiven himself yet... But I don't want him to lapse into a desperation and a resignation he won't be ever able to come out of, I don't want another Takano... He must understand there is someone who cares him, nevertheless._

"You should ask him to come here, too. We might need him." the blue-haired girl proposed in the end.

"I don't mind about that." answered Shion "And neither Irie-sensei won't, he looks physically fine. but will Gi-chan agree? I fear he won't fancy going away... On his own he is already hard to excite, and with his actual mood, now..."

Both in Ibaraki and Hinamizawa, the present people started looking at each other with a sense of dismay. Now that his sister was not with him anymore, the only one who could probably convince him to muster up his low courage was sleeping by him, and the others didn't know how to cheer him up. And so, they were afraid that the destiny reserved to those two boys would have soon been theirs, too... Everyone was getting low-spirited, they were beginning to fear there was nothing they could do in the end, and they could hear the steps of their approaching end...

"No, I can't take this!" a shout filled suddenly the air of the room of the hotel, and of the one inside the Manor.

The others looked around themselves, nearly stunned by those words. Who had told them?

It had been Keiichi. It had been Keiichi, who went on yelling: "That brat is going to join us, if you want! Don't worry about how to do it, leave it in my hands!"

"Really?"

"Really. And since I am ready to do anything I can, now, I won't allow anything on this damned planet to block me, got it?"

"But..."

"But what? I don't intend to stay in the cold while twiddling my thumbs! How could I die in peace, if I was aware I did nothing to avoid my fate? I will never get along with this feeling, I would never be able to look in the mirror anymore! Then, if you want to stay here and go on crying, feel free to do it, but don't complain if something bad happens! So, who is with me?"

"Ke..."

"I DON'T WANT TO HEAR QUESTIONS, I WANT ANSWERS! WHO'S WITH ME, I SAID?"

The others couldn't believe to that declaration of strength. But, thanks to that, they could feel a new fire coming from their hearts. They knew him, they had realized he wasn't surrendering, he was going to be their warlord, even now, even in that day, even far from all their other friends acquaintances... He would have been able to make a new miracle, they could sense it, and so he would have been able to lead them. That new enthusiasm had infected all of them, and Keiichi was the author of this.

He would have never capitulated to this destiny. During all this time, since the very beginning of that story, he had never been able to really assist his friends, he was always at the mercy of the events, running desperately to avoid the unavoidable, just like the others. At least, this was what he was thinking about himself. But now he was tired to continue in this way, now he would have ceased to be influenced by destiny, and he would have begun to influence it in turn. He would have looked Fate directly in its eyes, and he would have made him understand who commands there. And so the scream produced by this strong will made the others jump, awakening them for the stupor they had fallen into. That was their old good Keiichi, always ready to lead them far from giving up, and in fact Rena heartily thanked him for that proud reaction.

"I like you're not surrendering, and we will be with you, Kei-chan. But what do you want to do, now? There is not any telephone, in their rooms. They only have a pager, and with that you can't send long messages to shake him with."

"I will find a way. Rather, is still the Clinic open, at this time? It's very late, now."

"That won't be a problem." Satoko reassured him "The main doors of the structure should be locked, indeed, but Gi-chan has been given a copy of the keys, and I have another. Going to him will be easy."

"Very good. Things have got to exchange here, I am fed up with fending and acting only defensively. It's our turn to attack, and Megumi-san and Goemon-san will soon learn how brilliantly we are able to do it!"

"I hope so, too!" exclaimed Rena. "Tomorrow they will see what we're made of..."

"Indeed!"

"They will regret to have challenged us!"

"If you're so resolute, I will be with you!"

Rika smiled. Another time, Keiichi had been able to make his friends go over that moment of resignation, and now they were able to fight. Kimiyoshi, once he had come back from the lower floor, would have been told about their plan, and he would have given them all the help he could... Because, in the day on the verge of starting, everything would have been settled, everything would have been decided, and she would have needed help from every member of the club she had grown up within, with no exceptions.

…

As Shion had imagined, Giancarlo was still immersed into darkness, in Mion's bedroom, at the basement of the Clinic. Silent, immobile, he was looking sleepless after the girl in front of him, like a sad guardian angel. It wasn't necessary for him to look around, or talking: he was presuming to be alone within that building, most of all at that hour of the day; therefore, he got vividly surprised and scared, when he heard a door squeaking. It was the one which led from the main floor to the basement itself, so evidently someone was coming...

"Who's there?" he tried to shout, without obtaining the result he was aiming for, since his tone of voice sounded like all but peremptory.

"It's only me. Have I given you the shivers?"

"Shii-chan, it's not time to joke..."

"I thought it was, in reality. Sometimes you are too serious."

The boy sighed, embittered: "No more chatting, please, I am not in the mood for this. Why are you here? It's midnight."

"We're going to Ibaraki, to rescue Rika-chan. Please come with us, your sister Flavia is already at your home, and she is preparing your case together with her husband. I will tell you the details while we are on the road."

"I don't want to come."

"I was guessing so. Would you prefer to stay with Onee, maybe?"

He kept his mouth shut, and Shion sat down on her sibling's bed.

"Gi-chan" she said softly, staring at Mion's apparently serene face "Don't make a fuss, please. Do you think you're the only one suffering? We're talking about my sister, too."

"I... I am not saying that... I am not denying it..."

"And you can see I'm trying to be brave and fight with my friends. Why shouldn't you, then?"

"Because... Because... Because..."

"Because?" she pressed him.

"Because... it's different... I don't want to... to harm anyone, if I did something I'd risk to..."

Shion looked at him: "That was what Kei-chan thought you were about to say... Did you know?"

"No..." he lowered his eyes.

"That's why he has dictated this to us." She handled a piece of paper "We know you, by now, and we are aware that you hate to speak, or hear long rhetorical speeches. But we know also that you love books, so here it is. Read these few lines, I am certain they will help you."

He obeyed. As a matter of facts, that text was made of just five-six lines, with no-frills, written in the usual Japanese style:

_Giancarlo, we can't promise to you we are going to win with no possible doubt. This depends on us, on you, but also on other things, known only to Oyashiro-sama. What we can promise is that, if you are on our side, you will be happier. If you even fight and lose, your soul will make peace with itself, because you will be sure to have done what you could. You won't blame yourself for this, and we can guarantee it will be far easier for you to apologize with Mion, when she gets up from that bed._

_What's our winning percentage, at the moment? We can't say that. Maybe it's somewhere about zero, maybe it's somewhere about one hundred percent. But we can say that, with you, it will be a little higher. Won't you lower our chance to survive, will you?_

_Our train leaves from Okinomiya at two o' clock in the night. Choose whether you're with us or not. We're waiting for you._

"I had never imagined that Kei-chan could write this." Giancarlo commented, when he finished reading "Wasn't he the guy with a strong will, capable to overturn even the flow of fate? In this text he looks to rely upon destiny, instead..."

Shion replied: "Gi-chan, read more carefully. We have not written what we believe in. We have written what _you_ believe in. You have never fully trusted yourself, and perhaps you're effectively too weak to reverse destiny... but you can still modify it a wee bit. It's not much, I know it, but it's something that everyone can do, and something which can make the difference between win and loss. However, look at the other side of this sheet, now."

He turned the piece of paper, and there he could read the signatures of every club member.

"Why?" he asked.

"Just a sign to show you that everyone is awaiting you." she explained. "Do you like it?"

"Yes, but..."

"But what? Don't go on disapproving and being fussy!"

"No, I was talking about another thing... Here there is also Kei-chan's signature, and Rena-chan's one, and Daijiro-kun's and Rika-chan's ones... Shouldn't be they in Ibaraki? How could they sign this?"

"He he" she coughed "These are technically fakes... But it's just like they are authentic ones. They would have put their signature if they had been here, you know that."

"Yes... maybe..."

"And there is another sign you might like. Give a glance at the bottom right corner."

He looked there, and he opened his eyed wide, while slowly commenting: "That's... Mii-chan's name..."

"Yes, it is. In practice, that's her signature, even if she didn't do it in the flesh. But she would have done the same, if she could."

"So, in your opinion, would she agree with... with you... Finally, this signature... It... It resembles her true one so much..." he said, slightly stuttering, and nestling the paper on his chest as if it was a doll donated to him. His last observation was not strange, in the end Shion had signed a lot of documents in the past, passing herself off as her sister, so she had learned to reproduce exactly her signature. And therefore, that insignificant particular was having a psychological effect on the boy, who was now staring at Shion. In the end, the green-haired girl had been chosen to talk with him because she was Mion's twin sister. For Giancarlo's mind, it was a sort of suggestion, it was a few like speaking with the girl he still loved, and being heartened by her in person.

So, he said in a fainted voice: "It seems I haven't any choice, have I?"

"No, you have. But we already know which one you are going to take. It's normal to undergo a period of disbandment, in moments like this, but you will be able to start again. You did it when you were little, you will do it again. You come from a family made of stubborn people, after all, and if there is a thing they have taught you, that is restarting from where you had fallen, and finding at once a new way to go through."

"Do you think so?"

"This is what Onee was thinking about you. In the end, Kei-chan is like a God who never runs into a defeat, strong, awesome, unbeatable, someone who never makes a detour from the path he has chosen... You're rather like a fragile man who is never certain about what he's doing, but who goes on along his road because he knows he's the right thing to do. He's the mighty Sun, whose light can be defeated by no shadow, you're the feeble Moon which can't enlighten as much as that other huge and hot star, but which can do also it when the Sun itself can't..."

In reality, those poetic words didn't belong to her, but to Rena. It was a concept she had elaborated on the phone with the others, taking the cue from what Alice had once told them, a day some time ago. And Shion had just learned them by heart, but while repeating them she was not lying. She was believing in them, too. And finally, it was also a sweet way to tease him, so she was feeling perfectly at ease while pronouncing them.

Then, she let out a tender smile, and Giancarlo didn't reply. There was no need to do that anymore.

"Could you give me just a minute?" he begged her.

"Go ahead."

He sat on the bed where Mion was, and this suggested Shion to stand up from there. Then, he took an object from his shirt. It was a pocketwatch.

"Mii-chan, I hope you can hear me..." he began to say, putting it in her hand, and closing delicately her fingers around it. "It's just a normal watch, with no particular value... But I had been given this when I was nine years old, after the evening when I had decided to replace my father. I have a strong emotional bond with it, because during all this time it had been reminding me that the spirit of my whole family is always with me, through thick and thin. But now I want you to have it, I hope it's going to help you as much as it had helped me. I want to give it to you, because now... It seems I really have to go. I am not still sure if I have any strength to show, to give my contribution to our cause, but if there really is a place for me here, if this truth really goes for me... even more so this goes for you. As well as the others are waiting for me, they'll be waiting for you, and I too. I know it will take months for Irie to find a cure, I am conscious mine will be a long wait, but I am going to be patient. I can't stay here all the time, but I can at least create a bond between you and me, with this watch... And once the day arrives when you're awake again, you will give it back to me. This is not a present" he endeavored to smile "But only a loan. I hope to see you soon handling it back to me." He lovingly kissed her on her forehead, and then he stood up.

"Shall we go? I suppose that we will find Flavia and Kasai-san, outside there." he asked.

Shion nodded, and while they were going out of the room two dull eyes were following their walk. As for Shion, instead, she was going on smiling, and Giancarlo asked her why.

"Can I tell you a thing?" she explained "Kei-chan was like a God, a model to imitate, the strongest of all the males all over this world, and probably he would have been the best partner ever possible, for Onee. But in the end... you aren't that bad, either."

And she instantly hastened her walk, almost running up the stairs, and without daring to control if she had made him blush, get angry or smile.


	57. The path of solitude

**57 – The path of solitude, the strength of a group  
**

_Ibaraki, 2nd March 1984_

Outside the train, there was nothing but darkness. Outside the train, it was pouring down.

On the score of the adverse weather condition, the speed generated by the engine of that modern and powerful locomotive had been slightly reduced, in order to guarantee a safe journey for the travelers present, and in this way they would have arrived at Ibaraki not before the sunrise. It was delay which was not expected in the beginning, but fundamentally it was a minor problem: forecast had said they would have found a shining Sun at the moment of their arrival, and the boys who had gone aboard were making capital of that extra time spent on the train, using those hours to rest a bit. They had to be in perfect shape, the struggles which were waiting for them would have changed their lives forever.

Hence, their eyes were all close, except for Giancarlo's ones. The boy was not looking tired, and he was gazing at the others sat by him. Looking out of the window was mindless, it was too dark, and the pouring rain was noticeable only thanks to the tiny drops squashed on the glass. So, he decided to contemplate how the others were dozing. Their sleep was not deep at all, and it was probably full of frightening nightmares. All of them were worried about the day which was on the verge of starting, so worried as to jump unconsciously during their rest, from time to time, and not only because of the rare bumps of the wagon. Satoko, Satoshi and Shion were hugging each other, like a united family made of father, mother and a daughter, as if the heating plant of the train was not enough and they were feeling cold. As for Hanyuu, she was sat on Akane's warm legs. The woman had decided to come with them, and she was holding the purple-haired girl like a sort of puppet... Now it was plain from where Mion had taken her passion for dolls.

The train was nearly empty, due to the late hour, and the absence of any noise allowed them to have a moment of peace. The sound of the rainstorm was softened by the one produced by the train itself, and this latter noise was rolling them like the sweetest lullaby.

They were all sleeping, Giancarlo concluded. He wasn't, instead, he was observing them, and he preferred to stay silent, not to awake them. He didn't want to rest, he would have never been able to. Unlike the others, who were more focused on the incoming day, he was obsessed by what had taken place in the past. Alice's and Mion's ends were still filling all his thoughts, and he couldn't either shoo them away from his mind.

He was aware of the difference between the members of the club and him. He had always believed not to be like them, and maybe it was the reason why he had been having trouble familiarizing with his new surroundings, during all those months. Alice was different from him, with them she had been having fun as if she had known them since she was born, while he... He had often been feeling a few uneasy, as if there was something which didn't work, in him. Their way to behave seemed incompatible with his, and that impression had always made him feel diverse from them. This bitter awareness was still the one which was making him think he'd better stand by, and reflecting about what had happened was all he desired to do, now...

Regrettably, he couldn't. Alice had died only two days before, and he had been told about Mion's coma just some minute later. Giancarlo would have liked to have days, weeks, months... at his disposal, to stay alone and be lost in his thoughts. In movies people who are in his situation live usually a considerable period made of depression and melancholy, but instead he hadn't been granted the permission to do it in turn. He had been hurled to Ibaraki almost against his own will, the unfolding of events had demanded it, and he had been asked to help them with that new issue, as if nothing had occurred. Of course, the club didn't mean to wipe the slate clean and leave the past behind so roughly, but to him it was looking like there had nearly had no time for his grief. _The show must go on, don't they always say it?_

But describing them in those terms was a bit cruel, and he immediately grasped to be too severe, towards them. Was this coercion so bad for him, finally? He already knew that, if he had begun to stay alone and not unload his sorrow outwards, he would have never been able to exit from that state. He would have always been sad and anguished, prey of his remorse, and time would have only worsened these feelings, rather than placating them. Had his friends sensed this? Were they pressing him on purpose, to go ahead and pass that moment? He wasn't fully confident about that, but he concluded it might be the best thing, for him. They often say that when you fall off a horse, you must remount it at once, or you will never manage to do it again. This was the same situation, and so he tried to make the effort to reason about the actual scenario, setting aside his persistent sorrow.

In the end, he guessed, how could be of service, there? Once they had discovered their enemy's will and they had decided their strategy, the club might move already like a remarkable attack unit, with or without him. Shion was going to replace her sister efficiently, and then they would have made it, exactly like when they had defeated the Yamainu. They had told him the whole story, a lot of time before, they knew that Takano's plan was to kill Rika and to annihilate the whole village, and then they had beaten them to the draw, while being helped by all their friends.

Giancarlo's flow of thoughts went on. Was that one a similar circumstance? More or less. Rika's survival had caught Goemon unprepared, exactly like what had occurred to Takano, and now Keiichi and the others were going to make the decisive move. Once they had rescued Rika, that man would have been forced to stay in prison for a long time, and Megumi wouldn't have been a serious matter, without his husband next to her. Maybe they would have met her at the party they were talking about the evening before, but they were conscious to have a great advantage even in that case, because Goemon's word was about to be seen as the one of a vile criminal who had confessed, and because it was ascertained that Rika had done nothing bad, in reality. It would have been enough to prove it, to convince the authorities of this elementary truth, and they would have been victorious.

They were about to parry their opponents' last desperate onslaught, and it was not to be their first time. The last summer, they had blocked each of the Yamainu's counterattacks, and now they were going to do the same. Of course, they had never looked to be prepared to their enemies' reaction, during both the past war and the present one they had always been in a tight spot, when the others took the initiative. They had always been good at retorting to the moves they were aware of, but in case of emergency his friends had always been in a quandary, because they were not able to foresee the others' choices and reactions... But now nothing unexpected could happen anymore, wasn't it true?

Giancarlo scratched his head, perplexed. After all, what kind of plan, what kind of reaction could ever take place? Without his bodyguard, Goemon and Megumi were almost alone, and two old people like them couldn't arrange a great counteroffensive. Further on, that woman didn't look the brightest bulb on the tree, and finally her husband was in an icy cell now, wasn't he? Of course, Goemon had tried to separate Rika from the village, in order to unleash the Syndrome in all its fury, but having a lot of friends was about to be the girl's sake. How could that man pretend his plan to be successful, while being forced to stay out of action?

On the other hand, it had to be said that Keiichi's last move was quite predictable. After all they had only one available choice, they couldn't do otherwise. Going to that party, and talking to the police commissioner, to persuade him to leave Rika go... Goemon might have imagined it, too, he was undoubtedly one sharp cookie. Then had he set up anything, to get in their way?

No, it would have been too complicated. Giancarlo could understand that... To keep Rika far from the village, he had confessed a lesser crime, accepting even to be arrested. But, after that decision, trying to hinder them further on was substantially impossible, he was strictly guarded... It wasn't just making sense. His looked a desperate move, it had been like digging his own grave. For the club, it would have been sufficient not to lose control, on the contrary of what had occurred during the march to the prefecture. That day, after those explosions and Nabiha's speech, Giancarlo had shown his worst side, and he was still regretting what he had done that morning...

_Explosions?_ Giancarlo's mind went back to that day. There had been explosions, indeed, there had been three of them. And Rena had almost risked to be swamped by the third one. It had been Keiichi who saved her, that time, and it had been the beginning of the misunderstandings between Mion and him, because the girl had finally figured out to be just a friend for him, no more than what Rena herself was. It had been a bad blow, for her.

But those blasts had not been the only ones. Before the protest in Okinomiya, there had been several landslides caused by special powders and explosives. Flavia had told him the details of those facts. Could Nabiha have been the author of all these acts of vandalism? Maybe he could, he had a motive to hate the Sonozakis, exactly like Goemon and Megumi, so he could have arranged all the bombs, the ones which caused the landslips and the ones who had damaged the palace of the prefecture. Had he admitted it? He didn't remember so. Nabiha had always been cryptic about the particulars of his plan. And furthermore in the last period all the adversities they had run into had forced them not to care a lot about him, guiltily. That man had committed a severe crime, but he was still Daijiro's father, and instead his son had been the only one who showed to be attentive towards him. If all of them had been more thoughtful, maybe the man would have revealed priceless pieces of info to them, even if he looked a proud person indifferent to this kind of courteousness... But the truth was that they had just forgotten about him, so they had precluded themselves from having this possibility. Sometimes the members of the club still made the mistake to neglect the ones outside their group, especially in relation with how they behave towards their closest friends. It was sufficient to recall Takano's recent death, to realize this. In this aspect they had to improve.

Anyways, they had to find the truth without any external help. The point was: had Nabiha the knowledge required to assemble a complex bomb? Perhaps he had, the one who could clarify this dilemma, Daijiro, had never told anything about this. That was a fundamental detail, and his friend had never declared whether his father was able to do them or not. As far as they knew, he could really produce them.

_My friend... _Giancarlo sadly smiled, continuing to ruminate on those words. _My friend Daijiro-kun... _But there was another hypothesis, about that unclear detail... _Daijiro might have not expressed his doubts just because it was not necessary, in his opinion..._ Nabiha had not performed his plan alone, everyone had already concluded it for a lot of time, so Daijiro could have kept quiet about this only because he believed the police and the club had taken for granted that his father hadn't built them, while it wasn't true. It was quite a twisted theory, but it was not impossible, his friend was not an extrovert boy, and he was never used to speak when it was not essential, most of all when the subject was so painful for him. It was a real pity that he was already in Ibaraki, and not on that train, Giancarlo would have immediately asked him otherwise.

But maybe he neither had to make that question to Daijiro... That woman's death... Nomura... Hadn't it occurred in Tokyo, when Nabiha was already in prison? And there had been an explosion even that time. So, if that event is linked with all that story, its author had to be still out on bail. And the most logical conclusion was that this person was the one who had produced also the other explosives, the ones used to cause the landslides and to raise panic at the prefecture. Nabiha had not made any bomb at all, probably.

So there was another protagonist, in this war. But who was this phantasmal Mr. X? Megumi could be discarded _a priori_, she was too old to handle explosives, and she was certainly aware of it. If it had been the bodyguard, he would have admitted it, and now the bombs wouldn't be a menace, since now he had been put under arrest too; moreover Satoko, after fighting against him, had described him as a man full of dignity and sense of honor... Giancarlo had never met him, but from that description he might say it wasn't like him to kill people with bombs. He didn't belong to that genre of individuals, at a first glance. Might it be Goemon in first person, then? They didn't know a lot about his real talents and gifts, but they could exclude this alternative, too. The bodyguard had heard his master talking about the murder of Nomura, and to him it didn't seem that he was talking about it as if it was a feat made by him. That kind of men would brag about what he had done, even if there was nobody around him. To Giancarlo, he was giving an impression of being a boastful man, and his servant would have instantly understood that he was the guilty, if he really was.

To sum it up, the simplest conclusion was that there was another person involved, a person they had never seen... which was logical, the enemies they were handling belonged to a wealthy family, and the money to hire more servants was not missing. Furthermore, Goemon had told Rika that he wanted to inject the new parasite into the bloodstream of a certain number of people, in order to generate chaos and give to the Syndrome to power to erase the village... But to do so, he needed someone else, he was blocked inside his own cell at the moment, unless he wanted to wait to go out of prison, in one way or another. But this last possibility was highly improbable, it was far more plausible that this sort of terrorist bomber had been given instructions to kill Rika in a first moment and then take care of the rest of the village. Goemon hadn't told it expressly, but he didn't want any survivor for sure, and instead the blue-haired girl wouldn't have dead because of the Syndrome. That dastard had to find another manner to get rid of her and complete his revenge.

But how were they planning to kill her? A bomb under her house in Hinamizawa? No, this bomber was surely a stranger, and lots of people would have noticed him, and his suspect attitude as well. He couldn't act quietly there. After all, even Tomitake, Okonogi and the Yamainu had to think about a cover, an activity whose purpose was to mask their real one, to make make the villagers get used to them. For example, Tomitake had declared to be a photographer, while Okonogi had opened a gardening shop in Okinomiya. It was the same principle, this new servant couldn't enter Hinamizawa and pretend not to be noticed, especially in that cold period when there were no tourists visiting the village.

Moreover, it couldn't be forgotten that they didn't have a lot of time to eliminate her. That individual had to do everything before the final council of the Sonozaki clan, as Goemon had explained. That part of his speech was reliable, in Giancarlo's opinion. So, since Rika was in Ibaraki thanks to them, they might be preparing something there, in that big city, and not perforce by using another bomb.

But where could they harm her? Did they want to come to the police station with some weapon and shoot her? It was impossible, a real suicide for them. Besides this, his friends were going to stay with her wherever she was about to be sent, and at the same time Rika would have never left her companions. They would have stayed all together, always and everywhere.

_Always and everywhere..._

_Everywhere..._

_Everywhere..._

Giancarlo had opened his eyes. He looked at the ones around him, in a daze, and the seeds of a doubt were filling his mind. He was thinking about a possibility he had never considered. _Maybe mine is just another stupid mistake... But... Have they thought about that chance...?_

_..._

"I miss Akasaka..."

"Hau?"

It was morning again, and the van rented by Kasai was slowly going to the police central, through the overcrowded traffic of the big city. The short but at the same time long trip was quite nerve-racking, due to the low speed permitted by the cars before them, but thankfully the vehicle chosen after arriving at Ibaraki was provided with four rows of seats: at least the ones occupying it were staying cozily. It was a cold comfort, just like the Sun which had effectively peeped out after the rainy night: nobody was feeling like chatting, and those three words pronounced by Rika had been the first ones since they had left their hotel. Sat on the third row, next to Hanyuu, the blue-haired girl had told aloud what there was in her mind, and after her ancestor's reply, she turned at her, annoyed, repeating: "I miss him, I've said. I would like to have him by me, in this moment."

Satoko knew very well the strong bonds between her little friend and that policeman, but she could say nothing to encourage her, for the simple reason she wasn't with them. Indeed, when the last part of the group had reached Ibaraki and the hotel where the others had slept, after a short dialogue she had been asked by Giancarlo to go with him at a certain place. He had been strangely enigmatic, but he was not looking like joking and he had resolutely insisted after an initial resistance by the rest of the group; so, she had obeyed at last, and their companions had been persuaded to accept that division. In this way, the couple had left the others, who were genuinely wondering what was getting into his head. Although they had let him go, they were still a few anxious about the emotional state of the boy.

However, Satoko was not there, hence, and therefore it was someone else's turn to have the floor. Keiichi, who had been sat on Rika's right, looked at her, hearing her exclamation, and he said: "I can imagine it, Rika-chan. But in this circumstance he can't help us. You know, we aren't going to physically fight. If we were, he would have been indispensable, like Tomitake-san, too. But tonight we are going to have a civil discussion with a local authority, if we can't convince the other officers before, and in cases like this he wouldn't be able to lend us a hand."

"But I'd still like to have him here with us. His presence would reassure me."

"He can't, anyways. You know that he had to move to Tokyo, after this summer. His job entails a big sense of duty and responsibility, and he can't come to Hinamizawa each time he wants, or each time you call him. Contacting him now would only make him uselessly concerned, he has a family to think about, now, and in the end there is nothing he can do for us."

Rika sighed, but she claimed to understand. Akasaka was far from her, she hadn't seen him since the end of the Watanagashi. Obviously, sometimes he had phoned her, to know how she was, and so she was used to bring him up to date about their conditions, but the young man could do nothing for her, in addition to cheering her up and giving her moral support. He couldn't leave his job and join her, his colleagues needed him as well, for an important inquiry they were conducting in the capital. Abandoning them would have seemed selfish, to him. Without forgetting that he couldn't travel that much with the little baby his wife had given birth to, and least of all Akasaka could ever leave his family alone.

As for Tomitake, the day before he had been informed by phone about Takano's death. Until that call, he was still in Tokyo, far from his lover and in the dark about everything. When they had told him all, they couldn't see his face from the receiver, but they could guess he hadn't taken it well. Had he even cried, because of that sorrowful news? They couldn't know it. That man had always been seen as a strong person, but they weren't sure about his reaction to such an event. But the cruelest joke was the fact he had chosen to stay far from her to protect her, because living in that city had allowed him to watch better over the moves made by the members of the _Tokyo, _which had meant he hadn't been able to make anything to save her. Unfortunately, the group of boys had to leave for Ibaraki before his arrival at Hinamizawa, and so they couldn't either try to comfort him; then, it was obligatorily Irie's turn to make it. It wouldn't have been pleasant, but he was the aptest for that assignment, since he was one of the people who most knew both Tomitake and Takano. Keiichi hoped he could manage to overcome that painful loss, but now he was obliged to care about something else.

The van went beyond a series of traffic lights, and the ones inside it were hypnotized by a silence as deafening as the one produced by the hooters of the car bottled up in that gridlock. Was this atmosphere about to last for the whole trip?

No, it wasn't. "At least Rika is still alive, and we have a choice to rescue our whole village." said abruptly Shion, sat next to Satoshi on the row before Rika's one. She was wishing to raise a few the morale of the group, and in fact she added: "We can't stop because of the past, it would be irresponsible towards our friends and towards all our village."

"Shii-chan is right" continued Rena, adjacent to the driver's seat "We have to be strong, we can't afford to be weak, when we are in front of the policemen." Daijiro, behind her, nodded convinced, and Keiichi seconded them.

"OK, that's how we're going to look. Blustering won't be probably enough, for now, but it will make our case stand out, and the commissioner will be possibly informed about us even before we talk to him. If I've well understood, we can't use the name of the Sonozaki clan to intimidate them, here it's like any other one."

"You're right. That's why, for example, I've no ponytail, today. Now, for you and for them, I'm just Shion, and no one else. Claiming to be the ruler of a family coming from a far place in the mountains would look exotic, to them, and maybe it would charm them a bit, but apart from this it wouldn't be of use."

"I see. You know, in my opinion it would have been a great advantage if Rika-chan had stayed hidden in her house, letting them think she was dead. They wouldn't have_ kidnapped_ her, if they had believed there was nobody to kidnap."

"Do you think so, Satoshi-kun?" Rika reflected about that, and she rebutted "But to do that I had to stay always at home. Instead, the day before yesterday I had instinctively gone to the Clinic, so I couldn't pretend to have passed away, it was too late to stage that... All I wanted was to..."

"I understand it, Rika-chan. You were worried, and there were things you absolutely had to know. Nobody is blaming you for this. Still, I think that if we had been able to deceive them..."

"No, Satoshi-kun, Rena is sorry but she doesn't agree with you." she kindly reprimanded him "If they have really a spirit on their side, they would soon discover the truth, regardless of our efforts to conceal it from them. And even if we were able to screw them, doing it would have been the worst choice to take. According to what we know, Goemon-san's plan is to administer the new parasites on a large scale and to make the whole Hinamizawa die, but actually he's compelled to do that only after Rika-chan has been far from the village for more than 36 hours, or as an alternative after her passing. Making him think she's no more in being would give him the green light to his foolish plan, and he would cause many other deaths. On the contrary, he knows that his crazy project wouldn't work if he put it into action too early, before its time, and he will stay calm as far as the propitious moment doesn't come... So, this is not like when we have defeated the Yamainu, this is the exact opposite... That time we had shown that our friend was dead, this one we had by force to make him see she's still alive, instead."

"I understand... I am sorry for..."

"Please, don't hassle yourself with that." answered Keiichi, while the van was turning to the right "All the opinions and the ideas are welcome, we really need them now. Rather, there is something else which is pestering me... This Ouka... is she a spirit, right? So is she a Goddess, or something akin?"

"Are you fearing she's omnipotent?" asked Rika, disenchanted "No, she isn't. Having a useless God with you is not a certainty of victory. I know it very well." she was staring at Hanyuu sideways, while affirming that "Ouka's powers have well-defined limits."

"Which are?"

"Principally, she can't peek at us without being noticed by Hanyuu or me. She's a relative of us, and the blood ties between us and she can suggest us where she is, if she stands within a certain distance from us."

"So if she's far she can't give a look at us, and if she's near you can immediately locate her, am I right?"

"You are. Secondly, if there is nobody on her side she can't do anything concrete. She can scare other people by various means, but she can't, for example, close a door, take a material object, drive a car... And above all she can't kill anyone, alone. She always needs an external help to make it, and this explains why she addressed Goemon-san, to achieve her desires."

"But hadn't you spoken about that murdering Orb? She was to rub you out with that, and she had placed it without any help, you surely didn't assist her. Wasn't it supposed to kill you?"

"Wait a moment. If she could, she would have stamped me out immediately, slaying me with a sword, or a mortal spell, and not with such a complicated method, don't you think so? Instead, she had made recourse to that sphere of energy, and not by any chance. You see, that thing could be activated only by an action made by someone else, and not by her directly. In the matter in question, he would have damaged my heart only if someone else had chosen to voluntarily put an end to his or her life, namely to make a sacrifice of himself. A gesture made by someone else, not by me or by Ouka. A sign of the will of who performs it, independent from the Orb and from who had created it, the one which definitely would have caused my death. Do you understand?"

"But with Goemon-san and Megumi-san she has been the one who created all that pandemonium, and if someone had been deciding to commit suicide it was due only to that... It wouldn't have been a completely independent decision..."

"It's just the same. You can put a piece of cheese on a mousetrap to push the mouse to give him a stimulus to go there, but in the end if you manage to capture it it's only because that poor animal effectively comes there. It's its choice which performs the last step of this process. At the same time, Ouka was not forcing you to sacrifice yourself, she was only giving a reason to do it. An extremely good reason, I admit it, but only that. She wasn't giving you an obligation you had necessarily to follow."

"I am not sure to have got this totally... But I guess that I've found out the most important part of it, which is she's like a ghost which can only frightens us, and nothing else. Before talking with you I was fearing to have no chance against Ouka... But recapping she's quite a useless spirit, I'd dare saying."

"Oh, well, it's not an astonishing truth, for me. I'm fairly used to powerless Gods." Rika grinned, while Hanyuu started yelling, complaining about her descendant's impudence. Keiichi, instead, was a bit uneasy, he would have never imagined the maiden of Oyashiro-sama's Shrine could say such a phrase. However, he quickly went on: "Is there anything to add?"

"Not that much. You might find interesting her main prerogative, which is reading in the other people's mind and hearts, yours included. It may not be vital, but don't forget it when you're facing our enemies. Then, of course, we can't talk about her to any other person."

"They would never trust us, I had already imagined it."

"Good. And finally..."

"Finally?"

"I am not even sure about this. The last time I've seen Ouka was just yesterday, at the police headquarters, while she was by Goemon-san. And in that moment she was like detached. She wanted to attend the match between them and us, but there was a dab of disappointment in her eyes. Maybe it was just a suggestion, but my intuition is telling me she won't be our main enemy, today."

"As if she wanted only to watch a show from the outside?" commented Hanyuu.

"Exactly. This is precisely what I wanted to say."

Hanyuu smiled, and then she looked out of the window. Next to them, there was a huge building, and the van had stopped.

"Have we arrived?" she asked.

"Yes, we are." answered Kasai.

"Then, let's go out of here." suggested Akane. Everyone turned at the fourth row, where there was also Kimiyoshi, and all of them nodded. Then, they left Kasai, who had to find a place where to park their vehicle, and they reached the entrance door of the station.

"So what are we going to do, what are we going to do?" exclaimed Rena.

"Our first step is actually obligated, they are surely waiting for Rika-chan, somewhere in this palace. Let's go all together where she has to go, and we're having a nice chat with the fellow who has been ordered to welcome us."


	58. The gum wall

**58 – The gum wall**

_Ibaraki, 2nd March 1984_

_9:00 AM_

On the second floor of the police headquarters, there was an officer who was waiting for Rika, in order to welcome her and start to handle all the tests and controls they had planned. But he wasn't expecting to get a visit from a so large group. He was ready to deal only with a little fearful girl, accompanied at most by his foster parent, instead he found in front of him two adults and seven youths. Then, the first thing he was able to blab was an elementary "Who... who are you?"

"We are friends of the girl you have led here." answered Akane, briefly. "We need to talk with the supervisor of the whole inquiry."

"I am sorry, but the commissioner won't be in Ibaraki before tonight. He will come to the station only tomorrow."

"We already know this, I apologize for expressing myself wrongly. I wanted to say that I am sure he has cautiously appointed someone to take his place, while he's not here. There must be a deputy, somewhere in this central."

"There is, indeed... I can contact him, but on the score of which reason? He's a busy official, as you can guess."

"There has been a mistake, we fear. Furude Rika-chan is totally unrelated to the facts you're investigating, and there is no need to oblige her to stay here."

"But... I can comprehend your apprehension, but nobody is charging her with anyone, we have only to make some verification. She will stay here only for a couple of days, to ask her some thing about this issue. You know, the results of the spectroscopic analyses will arrive tomorrow, and with a quick comparison and another simple questioning we will definitely clarify everything..."

"So you will not be able to do all by tonight. As expected."

"Yes... But why are you in such a hurry? I don't understand."

"This is a vital matter." Keiichi roughly broke off his speech. "Now, where can we find this vice you were talking about? I must let him know the longing he had committed."

"Longing? We are doing our job, you can't insult us in this way!"

"We're sorry, he has been a little too instinctive" Rena apologized "But he was well-meaning. Please, we really need to quickly explain the situation, or it will be a tragedy!"

"I don't see how a tragedy might come out of an insignificant routine control..."

"So can't we either see the actual responsible, now?"

"No, no, you can, it's your right... But you can't enter an office and talk with a public official, without obtain an authorization first."

"And where can we get this authorization?"

"Go to the hall where the concierge service is, close to the main entrance, and describe your issue to the employees. I am certain they will give proper assistance..."

"If we really have..." commented Keiichi "OK, let's go all down there... No, wait, it's better to split up. Kimiyoshi, Akane and I will run downstairs, to obtain this appointment. The others will stay with Rika-chan, to keep an eye on what is happening here, and eventually to give a hand to speed this annoying rigmarole. If that's the case we will ask for you to join us, but for the moment this should be the best thing to do."

The three of them left the room and the officer, a few irritated for being considered like a suspicious person by that arrogant kid, and then Keiichi pushed the button to call the elevator, which promptly arrived. "Good, a stroke of luck!" he exclaimed "I was afraid of finding a throng here, but it seems we won't have to wait. Thank Goodness!" And in fact, in less than thirty seconds they were on the low ground. But their fortune ended soon, and they rapidly realized it, catching sight of the long line of people before them. The throng they were fearing before was really present, just it was on some floor below.

"Oh my... I am conscious we are in a big city, but now this is an exaggeration!" All of those men all had to apply to the reception desk. How many were they? Twelve, fifteen, twenty... It took some time even to count them. They had all come to the central that day, for the most various motives, and surely the cause which had made them go to the station was legitimate... But they were a pestering setback. And moreover Keiichi noticed that all that row of individuals winding along the corridor was about to be helped by a single woman, a smiling young secretary, polite and good-mannered but terribly slow at assisting the citizens coming in succession. Contemplating her exasperating slowness, the boy was believing to admire a sloth rather than a human being.

Keiichi spent the following twenty minutes tapping nervously on the floor, while Akane and Kimiyoshi could do nothing but sitting on the chairs present along the wall of the hall. Why was that woman alone? Why wasn't there somebody else, behind the desk? Hadn't they seen how many people were next to that office? Maybe the crowd of that day was an exception, an extraordinary event; maybe Keiichi had been doomed and usually there were many fewer citizens, in that place on the other days, but that was still a bad negligence. Furthermore, the rest of the row wasn't complaining for that late, they were waiting for their moment silently and well-composed: feeling to be in minority with his nervousness, Keiichi couldn't protest because of the awaiting, to push for a quicker treatment. He would have been tagged like an impolite foreigner, an insolent boy who didn't respect the others' hard work, and the police would have listened to him against the grain, which was something to avoid.

At least, stuck there, he had time to reflect. He was doing all of that to rescue his friends, and that was something ascertained. But at the same time that truth was making him feel uneasy. During all his stay in Hinamizawa, since the very first day he had been in the village, he had considered his classmates "only" as friends, and not as anything else, and this had created a lot of misunderstandings with some of them, with Rena in the beginning, with Mion later. For him, having good companions had been decisive, they had permitted him to start a new life after what he had done in the past, which wouldn't have been possible without their support. But at the same time, that desire to have a lot of mates had induced him to imagine the two girls were only good friends, and he hadn't realized their true feelings; he had never loved one of them, in reality, for him friendship was much more important than love itself. And now it was too late to find a remedy for that inconvenience, but he wanted still to find a way to put it right. He was aware to have disappointed them, by not exchanging their sentiments, and he knew also it would have been fundamental to unravel things with them, after that story had ended. _I ought to become more mature, one of these days... But to do it I need to get to the bottom of this. I will be unstoppable, I will do it for all of us. _

Finally, their turn came. Kimiyoshi and Akane stood up and they joined him, while the secretary was greeting them with an expressionless tone of voice, before mechanically asking the reason of their visit.

"We need to have a talk with the responsible of the Seohara case."

"That one?" she leafed through a messy pile of sheets, to find the document she was searching for. "Hmm... Yes. You're looking for the commissioner then, but at the moment he is..."

"... Out-of-town, we already know. We want to talk with the _actual _responsible, in fact, the one nominated by the chief to take momentarily his place, or the one appointed to direct the inquiry of this case."

"Oh, I see... Wait just a moment..." That secretary looked quite hare-brained. However, she browsed the pile of sheets she had checked earlier, before realizing it was the wrong one and taking a short stack of directives and circulars. Then, she slowly took the phone, letting fall the receiver twice, and once she had taken back the control of the situation she dealt an internal number. Then, after a short communication, she said: "He's waiting for you. Fourth plan, third door on the left."

…

_11:30 AM_

"How did it go? How did it go?"

Rena was waiting outside the room where Rika had been led. Shion, Satoshi and the most of the group had come in that office as well, following the blue-haired girl and the policeman. The one on the wheelchair, instead, had preferred to stay out of it, in order to see when Keiichi, Akane and Kimiyoshi arrived, and to let them realize where they had been accompanied.

And so, when she saw Keiichi and the two adults coming back, she had waved them to make them see her, and she asked them the outcome of their meeting; unluckily, that question was rather a set phrase, said mostly because of a matter of politeness and courtesy. Their frowning faces were telling all.

"We have talked with the deputy for more than a hour." he explained "He has been pretty kind, if I have to tell the truth, but he's not a brave soul. He will never allow us to bring Rika-chan to Hinamizawa, without the permission by the commissioner."

"Haven't you suggested him to phone to his chief? He would have been enough to describe him our situation, to show him the absurdity of thinking that Rika-chan has anything to do with this, and..."

"No, Rena, it's not so simple. First of all, they told us he was busy for the whole morning, he would have been back in Ibaraki sooner, otherwise. And moreover, this case has been very important for the police of this city, Seohara had killed three friends, including his brother, so from their point of view they can't treat any perspective with thoughtlessness. The commissioner will never let Rika-chan go only after a chat by phone, without talking directly with her."

"And so? What can we do?"

"In the meanwhile let's wait for them to finish, we should eat something. It's nearly lunch time, and I suppose the officer with Rika-chan will have soon a break, too. It won't take a lot before he's done with it, for this morning."

"And then?"

"And then, when the officer comes back from his pause, we will keep on standing here. Our continuous presence will get into their head that we aren't joking, and that we are seriously concerned about her destiny. At a later stage, if we aren't able to persuade them, we will get ready for tonight's party. The preparation will take some time, and we must check if Akane-san's husband has succeeded in giving to us the invitation."

"I see you have a lot of faith in us." commented Akane, ironically.

"We can't risk. We must make sure that everything is OK, as far as we can. With o without the invite, we are going to participate in it, but as you can imagine we would devise different strategies depending on the cases."

"Will Rika-chan come, too?" asked Kimiyoshi.

"She will, she has to. The Sonozakis have asked to give an invitation to all of us, and Rika-chan is free to go where she wants, within the city, she has not been arrested yet; looking at her and talking with her might convince the commissioner. Furthermore, we belong to the same group, and we have always handled these issues all together, haven't we?"

…

_3:00 PM_

"Here you are, hallelujah! Where have you been, all this time?"

Giancarlo and Satoko had just joined the group, which was still at the central. Keiichi was losing a bit his patience, and he was urging the officers to hurry, pushing them to accelerate some procedure, to skip other ones, and so on, but the most evident result had been the fact that the policemen had begun to turn a deaf ear, ignoring him and his orders. They probably were afraid of the commissioner's reaction, more than of him, and they wanted to dodge the punishment he might give to them. That's why he had made that rough question to them, as soon as he saw them, as if they had just wasted some precious time.

"We've dealt with a lot of things." answered Satoko, not so astounded by Keiichi's reprimand. "And we have even had a look at the edifice where the party is supposed to take place."

"Really?"

"Yes. It is a large building, but littler than what I was expecting. Its sizes are comparable to the Manor's one, except for the fact it's made of multiple floors, four to be more precise. Every floor there is pledged for a different purpose, and on each of them there is a main hall and a bunch of littler rooms, except for the underground one which is reserved for parking cars, and in fact there is a separate entrance for who enters with his automobile, different from the one for pedestrians. But the most important fact is that, coming both from this latter entrance or from the garage, you have to go through two doors in rapid succession, to reach the main hall on the low ground."

"Two doors?"

"Yes. If you arrive from the entrance reserved for pedestrians, there is a luxurious revolving door, and after a pair of steps there is a fire door, one you have to pull, to enter. Instead, if you come from the garage, once you go upstairs you run into a heavy metal gate, and soon after that you have to pass another fire door. And finally, when you want to go from the main hall to the one on the first floor, the one where we are going to pass the evening, you have to go beyond two further doors, which are placed just after the flight of stairs. And they are assembling also a metal detector, in front of the flight itself. The commissioner won't be the only authority, and security has not been ignored. That's one more gate, we could say."

"But why so many doors? Safety reasons?"

"I am not sure. But I think to be in a position to guess the real motive of this layout. I've discovered that they use those halls also for concerts, and little musical shows. Then, in order to have the most enjoyable plays, they have used the fire doors to make the locations soundproof. The other ones, like the revolving one, were not fitting for this purpose, it was technically impossible to make it, so I imagine they have added other doors to reach their aim. The structure of the building allowed that kind of decision, so there was no reason not to do it. They have installed another door next to each of the old ones, in order to be sure that no noise could come from the outside to the various halls, and vice versa."

"And at the same time no sounds from the low ground can reach the hall on the first floor, have I well understood?"

"It seems so. Of course I couldn't control it in person, today there were lots of people busy about setting up tonight's gala, and I couldn't annoy them by going on closing and opening. However, from what I've been able to examine, all the rooms of the structure have been separated with at least a fire door, if not with two gates. They wanted to be absolutely certain that nothing from one of the halls could disturb what is occurring inside the others."

"Oh."

"And moreover... All the perimeter of the various locations are scattered with pillars. There are dozens of them in each room, it seems to be in a Greek Temple. They have been put them in a way of creating a sort of corridor which runs all around the hall; I don't know whether they have only an aesthetic purpose or there is also a practical reason, I couldn't say if the weight of the structure is held up by the walls or by the pillars themselves, or by the two of them, too."

"Satoko-chan really likes to see how buildings are made!" exclaimed Shion "She will be an excellent engineer, after she grows up!" Satoko blushed, glad to hear it.

But there was another thing that was harassing her mind. She had promised not to tell anything, but she was fearing that something might go wrong.

…

_5:30 PM_

Keiichi had surrendered, for the moment.

As they could foretell previously, their attempt to convince the officers to let Rika go home was not successful, the police simply couldn't understand the urgency of the matter, and after all they couldn't tell them about the Syndrome, the chance they trusted them was about zero. The girl was expected to show up at the central even the day after, which was unacceptable for them. To the group of friends, there was nothing left but going to that party and dealing with the commissioner himself. Therefore, since the policemen had finished the tests and the verifications for that day, they all went to the hotel, to wear the dresses for the incoming evening.

And once reached it, they went directly into their rooms. Nobody was feeling like having dinner, they were too tense to put something in their stomaches.

…

_8:30 PM_

The moment had arrived, in the end. Wearing their best clothes, there going to take part in the party at Ibaraki's Great Conference Hall. Keiichi had decided not to use the suit he had availed of that day at Okinomiya prefecture, and he was now wearing a black smoking, with a white shirt and a red-striped tie. Giancarlo had a similar outfit, except for the tie which was blue monochrome. Satoshi, who hated choking ties, had chosen a dark brown jacket, with a shirt whose upper buttons were undone; in this way he was looking like more extrovert and jaunty than what he was in reality, but in this way he was feeling fine. Daijiro had been a little hesitant if wearing in turn a smoking with no tie or preferring a traditional kimono, like what her father used in that kind of occasions, but in the end she had listened to Rena's suggestions, and he had chosen the former. Finally Kimiyoshi wasn't wearing a special suit. As well as Kasai, he was not going to enter with them, he had guessed to be more useful if he stayed out of it and kept an eye on what was happening outside, together with the bodyguard. They would have stayed at the central, and they would have rushed in only if any significant news had come to their ears.

Switching to the women, Shion had a long purple evening dress, adorned with a belt of the same color and a white rose on the chest; she had not used the one usually employed by the leading women of the Sonozaki clan, as form of respect towards her sister. Akane had done the same, and she was wearing a relatively ordinary dress, black with a dark green band on her hips, surely more austere than the one Mion would have had, if she had been with them. Satoko had been given a checked dress, violet and blue, with a long skirt which almost touched the ground, and a dark flower fastened on her hairband. And the blond-haired girl had also helped Rena to dress up, so the girl was wearing a pink dress with quite a plunging neckline and a pansy directly leaned on her hair. Hanyuu and Rika, lastly, were wearing a kimono: the former had chosen a white and sky-blue one, the latter, who didn't want to look like a doll, had preferred one with darker colors, and no particular decorations.

They went up the stairs which connected the road to the main entrance, and they pushed the revolving door, before Keiichi pulled the fire door and he kept it open, to gallantly allow the girls to enter.

"It would have been nicer if they had let it spread, instead of forcing each guest to turn the handle. This is an smart-set event, isn't it?" commented Shion.

Satoko answered: "The purpose of fire doors is to be opened only when necessary, you can't keep them open. They would have useless, otherwise, they have been put here to soundproof the hall and to protect people from blazes, and they can do it only if they are well closed."

"Then they could ask one of the waiters to open it each time someone comes, at least. It would have been the minimum."

"Uhm... Yes, I must say you're right, they could easily do it. Maybe there had been unforeseen difficulties, and they were late with the preparation, so they needed every single worker to finish it. But this is just a hypothesis."

"Organization full of gaps, I see..."

"I am not responsible for that, why are you saying this to me?"

"No, the truth is another" illustrated Daijiro "The door had been left open, indeed, but the old man before us had accidentally closed it."

"Then shame on him! Hadn't it occurred to him that it was so for a reason?"

"Don't be so rude now, Nee-Nee. However, this is just a minor matter, a minuscule one. And moreover we aren't here to have fun."

Shion nodded, and she looked around herself. As Satoko had described it to her that afternoon, that ambiance looked like a Western temple. Full of pillars, here and there, and with some white statues similar to the ones made in Ancient Greece and Rome. Furthermore, from there they could see the other fire doors: the one which led to the garage, wisely hidden behind a pillar, and the one which brought to the upper floor, just after a flight of stairs. There was also an elevator, on the right, but they were not about to use it. An ancient location mixed up with modern element of architecture... That sounded pretty original, but the result was not unpleasant on view. The fire door had been conveniently painted to make them match with the rest of the hall, and they were looking nearly like a majestic gate leading to the several rooms and settings of the palace.

By the way, the hall they had reached was not empty at all. There were a lot of people, most of who was looking ready for the event. Not less than thirty-fourty individuals. Maybe the one they were seeking was there too, but they couldn't recognize him, they had never seen his face before.

"Why are they here?" asked Hanyuu, puzzled "The party should take place on the floor above, not on this."

"They are waiting for the evening to start" answered Akane, who had been told about all the details by her husband "They are waiting to be called by the butlers. Once the majordomos start to make a list of the guests, we will be asked to come to the metal detector one-by-one, and then we will go upstairs."

"This is really a strange procedure."

"The commissioner _is _a strange person, they told me. A peculiar individual, with a marked taste for pleasant activities and original expedients. He likes to have fun, whenever the chance to do that turns up. You would never say is such an important authority, when you talk with him." By that description he was looking to have something in common with Mion, but nobody dared to say it, recalling their friend's state. However, Keiichi had thought it, too, and he concluded that he could take advantage of this interesting news, using this similarity to find the most suitable topics and words, to make sure to convince him.

But now the butler was starting to speak, as foretold by Akane, and he announced they were going to call the invites in alphabetical order, using as landmark the Western letters. The attendant didn't say it aloud, he would have never dared to, but that was a way to ensure that the commissioner turned out to be the first one, because his family name was Abanura. _Another extravagance... Undoubtedly he is a type,_ thought Satoko, while she was hearing Akane revealing it to them. At least, in this way they had seen who he was, and his look too. A sixty-years-old man, apparently with a demure gaze, gray hair and eyes and a short beard; but he loved to talk with the ones adjacent to him, from time to time. Apparently, at a first glance there was also the risk he didn't took the matter seriously, but if he was the commissioner, he probably wasn't that negligent, the group could be relaxed about that.

However, there was something strange in that process, again: in five minutes, they had called nearly all the guests, but the name of none from the group had been had been told. _Furude _Rika had guessed they would have looked for Hanyuu and her quite soon, but they were realizing they were about to come last.

"I imagine there's a mistake." said Keiichi.

"Maybe not." replied Rena "We're last-minute guests, the Sonozakis had contacted the organization quite late in the end. I think they have been compelled to add our names after they had written the whole list on that precious parchment, and they didn't think about reordering it."

"I see... Yes, this is the most logical explanation."

And in fact, when all the others had already left the hall on the low ground, the butler began to call them, too.

_Furude Hanyuu-san..._

_Furude Rika-san..._

_Houjou Satoko-san..._

_Houjou Satoshi-san..._

_Maebara Keiichi-san..._

_Nabiha Daijiro-san..._

_Ryuugu Rena-san..._

_Sonozaki Akane-san..._

_Sonozaki Shion-san..._

They all went through the metal detector, without any signal by the machine, and one at a time they went upstairs, apart from Rena who used the elevator, and they entered the big hall on the first floor. Then...

_Serco Giancarlo-san..._

He went to the gate, but the detector rang.

"Oh, that's a good one!" he exclaimed.

"Have you any metallic objects with you?" asked promptly one of the attendants.

"Well... I don't think so. I have not keys, I have neither my wrist watch."

One of the workers walked under the sensor, to check that the device had not tilted, and there were no sounds. Then it was Giancarlo's turn again, and the alarm rang another time.

"Are you sure you have nothing with you?" he was asked.

"I don't get it... My pockets are almost empty, there is only my wallet and my handkerchief, and..."

"Then we must search you. It's our duty to perform this procedure, we hope you can understand."

"Is there anything wrong?" asked Rika, who had noticed he hadn't entered yet, and who had come back to catch a glimpse at the situation.

"Hmm... No, I don't think so." Giancarlo told her "Please, go up and reach the party. We've no time to waste and they are awaiting you. I will join you in some second."

A bad presage ran down Rika's spine. "No, let's wait for them to finish. We can still lose a minute or two."

"This is not the case to do it, Rika-chan. It might take more than a couple of minutes."

"I don't want to leave you alone."

The blue-haired girl's comment left him open-mouthed. And Rika went on: "I don't want our group to split up, again. I've already seen what happens when you leave people with no defense. We've already left you alone once, and I've seen what they had done to you. They had injected the new Syndrome inside your body, you had been on the point of dying... And I don't want to repeat the same mistake..." she was starting to cry.

Hence, Giancarlo knelt and caressed her head: "Rika, I'm happy you care about me, but you must go. That time I wanted to come with you, do you remember? It had been... It had been Mii-chan who forced me to stay in Hinamizawa. Now, I want you to go, without me. You must go all together up there, the commissioner has to have a talk with the person concerned, hasn't he? As for me, instead, I am a horrible speaker, you know it, they don't need me as much as they need you. Have you understood? Every second is important, we can't afford any delay. Please go, now."

But Rika answered, still weeping. "You... You are contriving something, am I wrong? What... What if something bad happens to..."

"Nothing can occur to me, I am with two or three attendants, I am not alone. I am within one of the safest places in the whole Ibaraki, don't you agree?"

"But... I don't want you to..."

"_Rika, please, trust me._" he repeated "You must make that guy realize he'd better let you go. Focus on that, only on that, and you'll be successful. You are the ones with the strength to break our fate, haven't you? So you must stay very close, you must stay all together, and it's my duty to give you the chance to use this power as best as you can." And after saying that, he gently pushed her to the entrance of the hall where the party had already begun.

"Gi-chan..." she whispered again, while Satoko was bringing her inside the hall on the first floor, and then the door was closed. Rika was worried, terribly worried, and she couldn't do without ask a question to her blond-haired friend: "Please, Satoko, tell me, what have you done today, you and he, while you weren't with us?"

"Are you saying the problem down there is linked with that?" Satoko was visibly concerned, too, Rika's words had made her understand something, but in the end she shook her head: "No, I've promised not to say anything until the end, Rika. He had told me that we must think only about the speech with the commissioner, and nothing else."

"I see..." Rika had made up her mind, and she was granting this wish of him. She was recalling when they had left Keiichi alone, and he had killed Teppei and caused a disaster, but Rika was finally realizing she'd better be less anxious and troubled. She wasn't questioning Giancarlo's good intentions, and she was conscious that believing in friends doesn't mean obligatorily to have always them nearby, like a mother would do with her nurselings, it means also to let them go alone, when necessary, acknowledging their maturity and ability. That was how they made that boy, evidently, he would have never felt like a leader, at ease in a large group, and Rika was beginning to accept it.

And so, when the others went to ask her what the matter was, she closed her eyes, smiling and answering:

"No... It's nothing. It's all fine. Let's go now."

…

_9:00 PM_

On the low ground, at a first glance there were only the two attendants and Giancarlo. The workers had asked him to follow them for the search, but he was standing immobile.

"Are you making a stand?" they asked him "You won't be allowed to join the event if we don't control, before."

"It would be useless." he replied.

"Useless? Why?"

"Probably because he knows I wouldn't give you time to do that. I guess he's waiting for me."

That sudden voice shocked the workers, and they turned at who had let it out. From the fire door which led to the revolving one and then to the outside, an unknown man had appeared. A man with an evil smile on his face and a remote control in his right hand.

"Good evening, Bomber-san." Giancarlo said coldly.

"Good evening, Serco-san." answered the other, before pushing one of the buttons of the remote control.


	59. Endless zero

**59 – Endless zero**

_Ibaraki, 2nd March 1984_

A thunderous rumble ran over the hall on the low ground, and a cloud of dust filled the air. None of the people inside the location could see anything, even because they had been forced to lock their eyelid, to protect their eyes from powder and rubbles. They had to wait for that sort of fog to clear, before grasping the significance of what had just occurred. The ornamental pillars next to the door leading to the first floor and the ones adjacent to the main entrance had collapsed, and so they had crumpled down, forming a mountain of cement three or four meters high and obstructing totally the passage. The two doors might be still untouched, but they were like locked, now, that pile of stones didn't allow them to reach and open them. And so, the builder of the bombs which were responsible for that disaster was in front of the others, grinning. He was wearing only a dirty T-shirt and a pair of blue jeans, and one of the sleeve was partially ripped off, making the cloth fall from his shoulder to his arm as if it was an old rag just leaned on his skin. He didn't care about his external look, as a good misanthrope who doesn't esteem the others' ruling, but his shabby outfit was not what was drawing the others' attention, now.

"Were you waiting for me?" croaked the bomber, wishing to tease the boy, who was staring at him surly.

"Kind of. You were the one who was making the detector beat even if I wasn't wearing any metallic object, weren't you? You were watching us, and when I was under the sensors you pressed one of these buttons..."

"Bullseye! I'm glad to have such a brilliant boy here, you will be able to recognize my greatness and my infinite shrewdness... But I'm so curious to see how you were able to figure I was about to come."

"It was very easy. Our names were in the end of that list, but our surnames had theoretically been ordered alphabetically: namely, firstly there were the original guests, called starting from A to Z, and this was the list they had prepared some day ago, before we had asked to be invited; then it was our turn, and our names had been disposed on that parchment below the other ones, but always following the same principle."

"And so you have noticed that..."

"...That this latter order was wrong. Japaneses may not be used to order names by using Latin letters, and I guess nobody here has noticed it, but every westerner would have noticed that _Serco _should come before _Sonozaki. _You know, the initial of our family name is the same, so they got confused, and they didn't catch your ploy... Anyways, on the score of this I was called last, after the others had already gone upstairs, one at a time, and now they can't go back down anymore. It was plain, it is plain that you are the one who wrote the final text on that parchment. Who knows, for instance you might have stolen the first sheet, the one with only the original guests, written by them before the Sonozakis' request; and on that you might have added us, before putting the sheet back to its place. In this way, I was to be the last of the list, and this was what you wanted. You wanted them to leave me alone, in this hall, and you have taken advantage of the commissioner's bizarre habits to do that."

"Or maybe the staff had just made a mistake during the compilation of that list. As you have said, they don't order names in this way very often, you couldn't exclude this possibility. Don't you agree with me this is a possibility?"

"No, I could exclude it, instead. You wrote all our names after the others, and you made it to make mine be at the bottom of the scroll held by the butler. Rena-chan was wrong, for once, that odd order was not due to the attendants' carelessness... The point is that if that list had been correctly ordered and written, the names of our group would have been shuffled together with all the other ones, Rika-chan and Hanyuu-chan would have been near to the top of it, for example. And I would have supposedly preceded a lot of other guests carrying the "T" initial, you couldn't make me relegate to the end, it would have been a much more visible trick. That's why you compiled it in this curious manner. And if you're not convinced yet, there was another clue, another error you had committed."

"Which was?"

"_Giancarlo_ is not my real name, even if everyone knows me so. It's only a shortening, my full name is Giovanni Carlo. The Sonozakis are aware of this, I told them the day of our arrival in Hinamizawa, and since this is an official event they surely have given the exact name to the personnel. But you couldn't know this particular, instead, and so you wrote it wrongly. I guess it was because of your haste."

"So, if everything had been right for you, there would have been a different name on that list, I see..." the bomber sniggered "Oh, well, the fact you got the knack of it was not a serious matter. I had imagined you could do it, but you couldn't either declare my presence aloud. If they had known there were bombs here, the party would have been canceled, the commissioner would have gone to his home, and it would have been your end, because you would have had no more chances to talk with him before tomorrow... Unless you decide to find the address of his house and to sneak into it, which would be a bad idea because you would be put under arrest without either being able to speak with him..." Giancarlo gnashed his teeth, that man had perfectly described the situation they were in.

"B-b-bombs?" had yelled one of the two attendants in the meanwhile, under shock but still there. "Who the hell are you?"

"Oh, yes, we are not fully alone..." the man commented "What a nuisance. And even the bomb next to the the door of the garage failed. We are not stuck here as I had wished."

The two members of the staff quickly turned at the door they were talking about, and imagining to have a way of escape they made a beeline towards it. Giancarlo smelled the deceit, and he tried to stop them, but it was useless. They went over the gate, and a second later the bomber pushed another button on his remote, causing a new burst which blocked even that passage, in the same manner of the previous explosions. Now all the exits were out of service.

"Don't worry, they are still alive..." said the man, still with his annoying squawking "I just obliged them to stay down at the garage, with another pair of colleagues of theirs. The entrance reserved for cars is like an ancient ruin, now, full of debris and pieces of concrete, and so they can't go out of there, for now..."

"I was guessing there was someone else down there, but I still don't understand why they have not cried havoc... Ah, sure, the fire doors."

"Indeed. Due to the gates they have installed, everything is soundproof, here, and from the garage you can't hear anything which happens here. The same if you are on the floor above, thanks also to these astonishing windows which have been acoustically insulated in turn, and which have all been covered by gratings, just not to allow anyone to come in or out. This palace is perfect for bombs, don't you agree with me?"

"So that party is going on as if nothing had occurred here?"

"Yes, that's the comic part. You know, the pillars I've made collapse are not fundamental to hold up the roof of this building, they are just adornments. By making them fall down without touching the doors themselves, the produced noise is absorbed by the intact seals of the gates, and the vibrations are not sufficient to arouse suspicions in the participants of that Great Gala. But if they tried to go down, they wouldn't be able to, the rubbles on this side is efficiently preventing the door from moving..."

"And nobody from the road could perceive the sound of the bursts, because there had always been a fire door between the point of the explosion and the outside. So nobody has felt the need to call the police. It's a very... rational schedule."

"Thank you for appreciating this." rebutted the other "The only noise they could hear was the one involving the entrance of the garage, because there are not particular gates there, and so I was cautious, I used a different genre of explosive in that case. Do you remember the gel we used to cause the landslides, some time ago? You certainly remember it, your sister is a cop... That's a sort of powder which is like a noiseless bomb, and then there haven't been any_ Boom! _at all, there. Moreover, that entrance is on a secondary road, and I doubt there were people who could listen to the falling ledges in that area. Ah, if you're asking yourself about that... There was a telephone down at the garage, but I've made sure it couldn't work, tonight, so those poor dolts down there are mice fallen into my delicious trap. And above, instead, there are absolutely no appliances..."

"Yours look a good plan, indeed."

"Are you challenging me, you little brat? Mine _is _a good plan. Effective, unbeatable, and very enjoyable. You should think about what those imbeciles are living on the lower floor. Alone, unable to escape, aware that there are bombs in the palace, in the dark of what is about to happen... Don't you think they are literally shitting their trousers, in this moment? Don't you agree with me, about this?"

Giancarlo stared at him. He was not like the bodyguard defeated by Satoko, he was rather a kind of mercenary without any sense of honor, who liked to make his victims suffer. He had got a screw loose, probably. But so, there was something odd. On one hand, he was tormenting the staff of the party with that atrocious psychological terror, and he showed to appreciate it; but on the other one he was keeping the guests unaware of the bombs he had activated, and he was looking proud of that. If instead they had discovered what had happened they would have had a conniption, allowing such a cynical person to ravish... There was a contradiction, evidently.

But after a short reasoning the boy realized which was the reason for it. On the upper floor, Keiichi and his group were screwing up their courage, they were fighting for their sake, they were discussing, they were doing their best, heart and soul... They would have done nothing of this, if they had known what was taking place there. And thinking that their efforts and their hopes were about to be useless, because of what those bombs were doing... That emotion was the sweetest of all the experiences, for an insane man like the one in front of him. His eyes were disclosing this feeling, the manner he was looking at him and at the crumpled pillars couldn't conceal his excitement for what he was going to do. _He's... completely mad..._ Giancarlo was at least hoping that Rika had finally trusted him, before, and that she had not tried to open again the door on the first floor, finding out the glitch. He wanted her to focus only on what they had to do with the commissioner, he was going to handle this alone. They had to let their light shine, if they desired to succeed.

And however, that was not the end of the matter. That battle had not been settled yet, and after all the bomber was planning something. Those three minuscule bombs were surely not the last of the evening, and if that man had compelled him to stay there, he wanted to do something with him. And in fact this was what Giancarlo asked him: "So, what have you in store for me?"

"Oh, go easy, haste is a poor advisor, don't you know that?"

"I have my reasons to behave so."

"As you wish, then. Can you see the cameras placed under the corners of the ceiling of this hall?" He indicated one of them with his left index "There is some of them on each of the floors of the palace, an automatic system which is very helpful, for the attendants but not only for them. It's so easy to take control of them, to keep an eye on what is happening within these walls while you aren't here, don't you agree with me? And you neither have to watch continuously the monitor, it's enough to program a device which takes a picture each time the camera sees a human figure wearing clothes different from the personnel's one. It's enough to install it on the camera looking at the entrance of the second floor, and here it is the result... I just had to check it a few time before the show."

"You really seem Satoko-chan's dark side..." Giancarlo smiled nervously "But so you have seen her and me, while we were here today." The boy glanced at the secondary halls all around the main one of the floor, to find the one he was looking for. The room of surveillance was just behind the bomber, but its door was open. There was nobody there, there was no chance someone had sounded the alarm from that sort of broom closet, and Giancarlo could do nothing but retort to what he was saying.

"Sure." the man answered, in fact "That little machine has made some photo of you while entering the hall, at nearly half past nine in the morning, and of you while you were exiting, at one o' clock. After you, there have been no unwelcome intruders."

"By hearing you, you already knew the intruders' identity. You have been told a lot about us, I'd say..."

"Well... Yes, that's the truth, I had observed your group during all this time, while the master and his wife were distracting himself with all of you. But I didn't want to pick on a little girl like your tiny friend, it would be no fun. Driving grown people and adults to desperation is far more funny. And moreover, I was curious to know a thing... You were expecting me, you were aware of what I like to do, and I'm guessing that you had also figured out there were explosives somewhere. I understand why you didn't warn the personnel, the party would have been annulled and we've already said what this would have meant for you, but I can't see why you let these first bombs boom. Why didn't you defused them, this morning?"

"Oh, about that... The answer is very simple... We did so because we had no time to deal with them. We had to take care of the major bomb... the one you had put on the second floor. We've seen them. Five plastic boxes, five explosive charges activable by a central system which emits radio waves at a set time. You had wisely placed the whole thing, in way of causing as damages as possible, to be sure that the structure can't stand after the burst. So... this is your final plan... You want to make this whole palace fall down, with all those people up there inside, and everyone will die, due to that. It's not a very... practical way to take Rika-chan's life, if I can criticize, but it was not senseless, since she's here with us, as always, and in this way she wouldn't ever make a comeback to Hinamizawa, at least as girl in being."

"Hmm?" the terrorist smiled, amused by those words.

"You know" Giancarlo kept on "once we had hypothesized you're going to kill all of us by resorting to your favorite hobby, we had to think about the place where you could position this huge bomb... The first floor was beyond question, while on the lower floor there is the garage, and among all those visitors someone could notice something was wrong. For the same reason, this hall could be excluded. By exclusion, it was much more probable you had chosen one of the other floors, which are actually empty and unused, and the most reasonable one was the nearest hall to the one where all those people stand now, in order to cause as many damages as possible. As Satoko had explained to me while we were here, if you place such a contrivance too high you risk to leave the palace upright, while if you put it underneath you can make it collapse like a house of cards. Hence... we knew where to look. The second floor was the answer."

"As I thought..." that sort of terrorist burst into a chilling laugh. "Yes, you're right, in these days they had transformed that whole floor into a warehouse, to cram with the wherewithal for the party. Very few people were supposed to go there, and in the last two or three days no living souls had come there at all, because all the necessary material had already been brought downstairs... So it had been fairly easy to leave a little nice present with all the other empty packages... Ah, if you want to know, some minute ago even the passages from the first to the second floor had been blocked, I couldn't allow your cute friend to go upstairs and ruin everything."

Giancarlo struggled to breathe. That person was not only a murderer... He was out of his mind: "You are a fool. So you have neither been touched by the idea that you're going to die with us? You can't go out of here, exactly like us."

"Not perforce. When you... do this job, you also have some notion about architecture, your carrier would be wrecked, otherwise. And, by disposing the explosive charge as I did, there is a little zone of this building which won't fall down. That one, precisely." He showed with his finger a corner of the hall. "Imagine a square three meters long and four meters wide, over there, starting from the walls... That is the safe area. I will stay there, and nothing serious will happen to me. The palace will cease to exist, and also the basement will be involved, those poor ninnies down there will never survive... The whole building will disappear... apart from this little spot. And nobody will get suspicious about someone saved by a miracle from this dramatic incident, they will think I have been just very lucky... Ah, of course you won't be allowed to stay with me..." he showed a gun cropping out of his pocket "I am not used to avail of it, it wouldn't be like me. I might have used to get rid of those annoying workers, before, but it wouldn't have been fun, don't you agree with me? But if you aren't good I will be forced to make an exception to the rule..."

"Hmpf, I wouldn't commit my life to these calculations, if I were you. A mistake would have severe consequences, for you..."

"I like to run risks." he licked his lips with his own tongue "This is what make me feel alive. You would never understand this..."

Giancarlo gave a look around. Could he reach the second floor, using the elevator? No, a control light on the panel next to it clearly showed that the booth had been blocked on the first floor, after Rena had used it to join the party, since she couldn't go up that long flight of stairs. The bomber knew her state of health, he knew she would have been forced to avail of it, and he had evidently found a way to sabotage it, and to block it once it had gone up. Then, could he use the telephone in the secretary's office, or the one in the surveillance room, to call someone? Neither that, there was likely one of them in those rooms, but even if they were still working the other man was keeping him rifle-range, and he would have never let him do that. Therefore, he couldn't reach the hall where the bomb was, nobody could. He had to trust what Satoko and he had done that day. They had had a lot of time to do everything, that hall had always been empty, and nobody had ever disturbed them. They had done it as well as they could, and now he could do nothing but hoping that was enough.

It was not about to be easy, however. That man was an expert in traps, explosives, and similar things... And he looked to have calculated everything. His wicked mind wasn't looking to have omitted some detail. _Now I understand how Keiichi is feeling, each time he has to face Satoko..._

"Ah, another thing you might be interested in..." the terrorist went on "Do you know who is there, above?"

"Are you mocking me? Sure I know. My friends are there, with the commissioner and some other guest."

"That's the point. And among these _other guests_, there is someone you would never expect."

Giancarlo gazed at him with interrogative eyes, and so he added: "Their names are not on the list, but they are up there, too, the commissioner wanted to make a surprise... Ladies and Gentlemen, also Sonozaki Goemon-san and Sonozaki Megumi-san have been invited!"

Hearing this, Giancarlo's eyes were on stalks. "H-How is it possible... Goemon-san should be in jail, and moreover..."

"It's thanks to you. The commissioner had been informed about all the chaos you had created at the police central. He knew also that you would have come here, that my master's wife was in Ibaraki as well, and he had also imagined the reason of your presence at the party, so he had organized something which he believed was funny. Without telling anyone else, he had invited them to tonight's event, to have an interesting debate about the issue, and he has brought them directly upstairs, before the others' arrival. I would have really liked to see your friends' face, when they have run into them again..."

"Oh, my God... And you knew this..."

"Of course, my master had been informed in good time about this, and he has found the way to warn me too. Frankly, our original plan didn't foresee his presence here, the palace was supposed to collapse without him, but I convinced him to take part in this game. You know, if he places himself in the same corner of the hall where I am going to put myself, he won't be harmed at all, and he will survive as well as I will. To the others, he will seem like a trapped dog, withdrawn in the little corner of the hall... Nobody will mind if he stays there, on the contrary your friends might even be glad to see him so..."

"We are not like you." Giancarlo replied, angry. "We don't glean pleasure from the other's malaise and suffering."

"Maybe, but for him it will be enough to stand there when the bomb explodes, which will happen..." he watched the hour "... In five minutes, at ten past nine. You have not time to do anything, to prevent your destiny from happening, now, don't you agree with me?"

"Ten past nine? It's a strange hour. They usually use times like midnight, nine o' clock, and so. "

"Oh, that's a little Easter Egg I wanted to give to my master. I have not chosen that hour randomly, but it's a remind of the past. The 10th of September was the date of his descendants' death, the one he's so obsessed why, and in this manner your death would have looked a sign of destiny, as a fatal karma which never forgets what the sinners do. Don't you think mine has been a marvelous idea? You should begin to realize this, we are just playing with you, like a kid who has a mouse in a closed box, and he's having fun while shaking the box and terrorize that poor creature, sure that it will never be able to escape from there..."

The boy contained his sense of nausea, and he replied "It's interesting to see how you like to chat about this. The cameras are still registering everything. Or am I wrong?"

"No, you are right. Even my device is still there, but keeping quiet would be such a pity, don't you agree with me? It's exciting to show once my abilities to someone who is destined to die in... let me see... three minutes, to be more to the point. Staying before someone else, shaking him like the mouse in the box, telling him he's to pass away in some moment, looking at the desperation in his eyes, and finally seeing he really leaves this world, while you are still here... This gives to you the thrill to feel like a prophet, sent by God, someone whose words are law... No, no, even better, this gives you the right to be like God Himself, to claim to be strong like Him, to have the power to decide the others' fate, to choose who can live and who can die... Is there an existence better than mine? No, there isn't, don't you agree with me?" He was going on laughing, bending down a little ahead, keeping his hand on his face like a person who was losing his power of reasoning.

Then, the bomber showed again the remote control he was still holding: "You know what's the best part of this joke? Even if you had inactivated the time device which supervises my work of art, I could always make the last bomb explode with this... And I am aware you have not been able to nullify this, if only you had tried to remove the antenna which has been projected to receive the signal, the charge would have come automatically into action, and it would have blown you up... It's odd that this is said by me, but my plan is bomb-proof, don't you agree with me?"

"This refrain is getting boring."

"You're about to change that nice character, once you realize you have no hope to survive. Let's see, what you had made to try to deactivate the bomb?" he put a finder under his chin, as to reflect "You have cut a pair of wires, which was useless because my masterpiece can explode even without any of them, there is a radio system governing the whole thing. You have changed the time on the device, in order to make it burst later, but I noticed it, and I set the right hour on it. You had built and hidden a sort of radio which emitted waves with the same frequency as the ones generated by the control unit in charge of the detonation, to disturb it and to put it out of order, but I found it with a device able to locate all the electromagnetic sources. You have moved the joints of the plastic boxes where the charges are, in order to prevent the walls from being damaged by the explosions; and so, I replaced them into their original position, after checking the safety seal present on the opening of the boxes... You know, this was also a way to check if you had attempted to undo them, even if I was guessing you found it too risky; you have been wise, and you didn't touch those extremely dangerous substances... Then, what else? Ah, sure, those cute traps placed next to the entrance... You wanted me to fall into one of those, but I am slier than you... I evaded them, and I put right what you had sabotaged. Have I forgotten something? No, I haven't... Don't you agree with me I've been good?"

Giancarlo swallowed, while his legs were trembling. He had overlooked nothing. He was a raving mad, but he knew his stuff.

"Well, it's almost time to die, for you..." the man went on croaking, while starting to walk towards the safe corner of the hall "It was funny, absolutely... But I couldn't lose. The key of our battle has been the fact I could come here after your visit to the palace, and fix everything. I had the last word, and who has the last words is always the winner, in the end. Maybe if you had stayed here to guard over the entrance, you would have had a microscopic chance, but you had to get dressed for the party, you couldn't renounce to it. And now... There's just a minute left, for your pathetic hopes and dreams..."

He extracted the gun from the pocket "I hope not to use it, you wanted this palace to go on standing, and you've lost, so accept your failure and die with it, and with your whole village. Trying to survive by coming here would be dishonorable... and moreover, if I were you I would never be able to bear with the destruction of the community you loved so much..." he laughed again, nearly making Giancarlo lose patience, and then he added: "Anything to say, before the inevitable hour arrives?"

"Just a thing. Are you really thinking to be a God? Don't make me laugh, you are not a being like that. They have always taught that God is a good entity, who loves the creatures as if they were his true sons. And you are neither a Demon. Demons have a strong sense of dignity and honor. This is what Hinamizawa has taught me, they had shown me how to fight with the others, with strength and respect."

"And now you have fought against me alone, you little hypocrite. Maybe that's why you have lost..."

Giancarlo didn't answer. He was staring at the ground. What had happened during all that time, the joyful moments and the sad ones, his friends' feelings, the inhabitants' hopes... Mion's coma, Rena's incident, but also Mion's ability to endure her pain, and Rena's strong spirit... And then Satoko's bravery, Keiichi's stubbornness, Satoshi's kindness, Shion's thoughtfulness, Daijiro's seriousness, Hanyuu's support, Rika's sense of duty... And her sister's fortitude... And the care they had always shown towards him, despite his behavior, despite his nature, despite his attitude, despite what had occurred, despite all... They all were passing through his mind. He was pinching his own fists, as preying for something, while his heart was beating frantically, as gone crazy. He didn't dare to give a glance at his enemy.

As for the other man, he was desiring to walk towards him, to look him in his eyes and to humiliate him with a last scoffing glance, but he couldn't. The bomb was to explode in twenty seconds, he couldn't leave that spot. But the silence suddenly arisen was getting on his nerves, and he couldn't do without saying a final phrase: "You're certain I am not God, nor a Demon, I see... That's fine, for me... But in the end it doesn't matter, because now there are only ten seconds left."

He couldn't detach his look from Giancarlo, his blood was inflating the retinas of his eyes, his temples were pulsing... As tasting a delicious meal, he was observing the one who was on the point of being overwhelmed and shot to pieces... And he finally said: "Ain't I a God? Ain't I a Demon? Ain't I an angel? Ain't I a devil? It's just the same, the only important thing is this: _I am better than you, you moron, don't you agree with me?... "_

Five seconds left.

A last, evil laugh by that man. Giancarlo couldn't stand it anymore, but he knew at least that in a few time he was about not to hear it anymore.

Four seconds.

Giancarlo was preying his sister, as if she was his guardian angel, begging her to protect him and all their friends.

Three seconds.

Giancarlo closed his eyes, stopping to breathe.

Two seconds.

The bomber rapidly crouched, leaning on the wall, closing his eyes and putting his arm before his face, to protect his body from the incoming rubbles.

One second.

Giancarlo reopened his eyes, and he abruptly raised his face, gazing at him instead of looking to the floor.

Zero seconds.

_Boom._

_..._

The five boxes exploded in unison, as their creator had programmed them, and a huge explosion run over everything which was around them. A terrifying rumble was heard from the adjacent houses, and everyone turned at the palace where the burst had just occurred. A thunder so scary to make the neighbors immediately foretell that a terrible tragedy had happened. Nobody could survive to such a powerful bomb. No matter how resistant and well-built the palace was.

But the fact was that, when the bomber opened his eyes anew, the palace was still there in its place, and the boy too.

...

"W... W... Why...?"

The man couldn't believe to what he was seeing. In the background, it had seemed to him to hear the noise of the explosions, but nothing had happened, had he got wrong? No, he couldn't, the walls had been slightly trembling, due to a powerful blast wave, so... Instinctively, he took the remote control, and he pushed manually the button which had to activate the bombs. He pushed it lots and lots of times, without obtaining any result.

"You'd better not go on so." said Giancarlo, coldly "It would be mindless. Your beloved charges can't explode, now, they don't exist anymore, for the simple reason they have already exploded a few seconds ago, as you had planned after all."

"T... T... That's impossible! How could you do that?"

"Phew, my heart was like a drum" the boy replied, ignoring what the other had just said "You know, before you were mocking me, and in this hall there was someone who was having fun with the other. That metaphor about the mouse and the box was cruel, do you know? But in that moment you were wrong about _who _was the playing kid and _who _was the mouse..."

"I MADE YOU A QUESTION, YOU BASTARD!" the bomber yelled "How have you been able to mess up my infallible plan?"

"It was not infallible, as you've just seen. Our other expedients were just smoke and mirrors, in reality we were sure you were about to neutralize them, what we had seen during the Landslide Affair and what you had created here were a confirm of your skills. But the truth was that _we wanted _that your bombs worked... Let's play a little game" Giancarlo sighed "I told you your devices have worked perfectly. So, what might have happened, in your opinion?"

"I don't have time for this!"

"You were looking like wishing to have fun, before. OK, let's make things short... The bombs have exploded, indeed, thanks to your good wireless system, but they were not placed on the second floor anymore. Because the point is that you had checked your seals to control whether we had touched the boxes or not... But we had not opened them. We had completely replaced them, keeping them well closed. And when the X hour had come, they were over the roof of the palace, unable to hurt anyone."

"WHAT?"

"Sure. Haven't you seen that aerostatic balloon, the one they had put up here for advertisement? They had anchored it to the railing of the roof to publicize the opening of a new department store, and so we used it. We had pulled it down, we have put the plastic boxes on the top of it with some adhesive tape, before leaving the balloon fly again, and so they were both far enough to become harmless and near enough to be still activated by the radio system present on the second floor. Satoko-chan is a true expert, she knew what she could touch and what she couldn't, and with a few caution she had hidden the charges inside the plastic bag she was carrying with her, in order not to let the cameras see we were taking them away; and then, by the fire stairs, we have reached the roof. There was not any filming device, there, so we could do everything freely. Ah, of course we were conscious that the bag might look suspicious to the promoters of the party, but we wouldn't have minded if they had searched it, when we had entered the palace: in that moment there was nothing special inside it, we hadn't taken the bombs yet..."

"Now I see why she was carrying that bag, I had imagined it was containing only tools to defuse my work..."

"It was, effectively, but that was not its only purpose. We knew perfectly which was the camera you had taken control of, the device you had installed on it was not invisible, and Satoko-chan has personally checked that the others hadn't any unpleasant surprise. Unluckily for you, the one you chose films only the stairs and the entrance of the floor, not the floor itself; so, we knew that you could see us while going in and out of the room, but you couldn't see what we were exactly doing there... You were trusting your ability too much, you were presuming to be able to find all our ploys..."

"The other cameras were controlling a too large area, your figures would have looked too small and my automatic device would have never worked on them... That was the most suitable one... And I hadn't time to watch personally the monitors... Don't blame me for this apparent mistake... But... But even so... When I checked the whole system, the charges were still there, and you had already left the building!"

"No, you had only seen the boxes were still there, but you didn't examine the inside. Neither you could break the seals and open them to check that everything was OK. It would have been a hazard even for the builder of the bombs themselves, you would have risked to blow them up before its time, and so you didn't see the boxes were different from usual."

"What..."

"That girl can make authentic miracles... Using only the material present in that improvised warehouse, Satoko-chan has been able to reproduce identical copies of those gadgets. Plastics, colors, weight, even the seals on the opening... Well, she would be a prodigious forger, if she wanted to."

"And so you were pulling my leg as if I was a perfect idiot! Why have you hatched out a so complex plan?"

"For a lot of motives. We have already said that I had to do all secretly not to make the commissioner run away from here, right? That's one reason... but there is also something else. You see, we knew that it was useless to just deactivate the charges, with any trick or ruse: leaving them up there, you would have noticed we had modified them, and you would have replaced the boxes. The best solution was to deceive you and move them, but where? We were on foot, we couldn't bring the active bombs out of the palace within her bag, it would have been too dangerous, and we neither could imagine a place where we might bring them, we have never been in this city before. So we had to concoct something else, to achieve all our goals..."

"Goals? What do you mean?" the man seemed to fall apart at the seams.

"Can't you see it? First of all, I wanted to make sure you couldn't use your little toys to menace our lives, and the best manner to make that was totally depriving you of them. After all, when they find mines or old bombs under the ground, the procedure is to set them off to make the zone safe. Secondly, this is a very good way to sound the alarm. The explosives you had used in the beginning have not been heard from the outside because of the fire doors, but the one on the balloon is completely diverse... They have certainly been put on the watch, thanks to that giant rumble, and so they have surely noticed that both the main entrance and the one leading to the garage are blocked without any apparent reason. They are going to remove the fire doors and taking away the rubbles... How much will it take? Twenty, thirty minutes at most."

The other one was drooling with anger, but Giancarlo didn't mind: "And finally, the most important reason... Until now, we had no evidence you were the responsible of these actions, and I supposed that you would have never appeared or talked, if you hadn't thought to be safe. Frankly, in the beginning I had guessed you would have been around here, the antenna on the control unit showed that there was a remote control somewhere, and then there was someone who was going to stay in this vicinity, during the evening. I was hoping these cameras, or even only the ones outside there, could see something interesting; a shot painting a man with a remote control would have been sufficient, but your exhibitionism was more than what I could imagine... You were not afraid of being filmed, earlier, you had kept on speaking like a vainglorious fool, and you had never turned the cameras off, because from your point of view it was useless and because the staff might have even noticed it, guessing that a black monitor would have been anomalous and giving you some headache. But now the situation has changed, and those tapes have registered everything... And that's not all: neither Goemon-san and Megumi-san will be in an enviable position, when the police examines them. A nice unexpected present, by you."

"I-I will destroy them! And I will kill you, you won't tell anyone what you have heard! Nobody will send me to prison!"

"Yes, you could try to do that, but your situation wouldn't change. The tapes are well hidden under the machinery in the surveillance room, and reaching them won't be easy... The others will come here soon from the outside, you won't have time to destroy all the evidence. Without forgetting that the attendants down at the garage know that you are guilty of placing the first explosives... and finally, using your same words... who would think you are not the creator of the major bomb, even without tapes? It has harmed nobody, but they are going to charge you with attempted homicide, they would accuse you of having tried to cause a massacre. You're risking to be condemned even to death..." In reality, also Satoko and Giancarlo could have had some annoyance, they had hidden what was happening from the police, but the evidence distinctly showed they had saved dozens of people, they would have let them go after a short formal questioning.

Rather, there was another issue. Giancarlo knew the bomber was bluffing, before, he had no interest in destroying the tapes: he was only a mercenary who had just realized to be anyway doomed, and he hadn't close to his heart his master's destiny to the point of hiding some evidence and aggravating his position. But however, he was starting to totally lose his temper, and that was something the boy didn't want. He was still armed, finally, he had to be careful about what he was saying. He remember the day at the prefecture, when he had rub it in Nabiha, beating a dead worse... He didn't want to do the same, he didn't want to be so cynical and angry, he wanted to improve himself, he wanted to show he was a good person, deep-down... His desire to make him pay at once for what he has done was tempting him, but he had to be strong.

In the meanwhile, the bomber hissed, groping: "But... I don't understand a thing... Your... Your group had always loved to do everything all together, to stay close to each other, to stay united. If you had been like them, you would have never come to this place alone with just a companion, and now you would never be here alone, you would have asked for help... And so, I would have won... Why are you acting so... What has gone wrong..."

Giancarlo didn't answer.

"TELL ME!" the other shouted, menacing him with his gun.

_Yes, maybe I'd better please him, it will be a good way to gain time while waiting for the rescuers... _"If you really want so. Yes, staying here in Japan has taught me a lot of things, about the importance of friends, about the strength which staying all together can give to you, and so on... Those youths are just fixated with this, in my opinion... But I will always thank them for this priceless lesson, really, and in fact I've also asked Satoko-chan to give me a little hand, to prove I've learned it... But at the same time, I can't either forget who I am." He took a pause "During all my life, I've done everything alone, I've taken the most important decisions alone, which might have been the wrong choice... but which has also taught me many other things. So, why should I forget them? I can mix both these ways to act, depending on the situation, don't you think it would be the best thing to do?"

The boy went on "The _Sympathiae Sanguis, _my great-grandfather's obsession, is not like Hinamizawa's spirit. It was a strength coming from the depth of the attacked individual, not from an external aid. It's a... more individualistic form of power, we could define it so. And then... this one..." he looked at his right arm, the one with the scars "This one is not only the symbol of my past, intended as concrete events, but also of my past as mental background, as character... These cuts are part of me, I am these cuts. And if it's true I will never happy to have been obliged to undergo this, it's also true that now I can't repudiate them, that this arm is here, that it's my arm, and that it is still fundamental, for me."

The man leaned with more strength on the wall behind me, while Giancarlo added: "Can you get it, now? I am not a leader, I can't speak, I can't fight with a weapon, I can't make traps, I can't be a solace for the others, I can't be a joyful person, I can't give power to the others, I am not God, I am not a Demon, I am nothing special... All I have is my soul and my mind, and what I have learned since my birth. And if being myself is the best way to help my friends... Why shouldn't I be so?"

The bomber was gazing at him, terrified. Giancarlo's look was intense and frightening, his eyes were completely black, broken like when he had assailed Mion... But now there was also a red undertone, inside them... As if someone was permitting him to keep cool, a guardian angel who was with him... And the boy continued: "I still must finish to learn from them, I'd admitting this. I am not that good in working with the others, and I am quite an insecure person, normally... but at least I have some faith in myself. You, instead... You pretend to be a braggart, to know everything, to be able to defeat everything, but finally... You are a man who is afraid of everything, including yourself. Someone who desperately tries to demonstrate to be someone, because he fears to be nobody."

"It's not true! You know nothing about me!" the man closed his eyes "And don't look at me like that!"

"Is it false? And so why were you going on saying _Don't you agree with me, _before? Can you tell me? In reality this refrain comes from your inner nature. You continuously ask if the others agree with you only because you fear that every your decision, every you mover, every thing you do is wrong, and you want to look for the others' approval... Like a quivering three-years-old kid. People playing with human fears do it because they can't deal with their own one, and they think nobody can... They have been defeated by their nightmares, and they try to make the others live the same sense of powerlessness. So, have I hit the mark?"

As only response, the bomber shouted like a wounded beast. The halls were soundproof, but Giancarlo almost thought that the others could hear such a savage scream, in spite of the fire doors... Anyway, the other had lost definitely his temper. The boy feared to have made the same mistake he had made with Nabiha, in the past... But the truth was that the one in front of him was unrecoverable. He was anyway destined to go ballistic.

The man, in fact, was now pointing his weapon at him. "Y-y-yes, I may be damned, but I won't be alone... I will drag you to Hell with me... Don't think to escape, there are a lot of bullets here, and you have no hideaways where you can take shelter... Die, you little bastard..."

Giancarlo smiled sadly. This was the weakest point of his plan... By accepting that showdown, he had obtained all they had to get... A decisive evidence against Goemon and his wife, his friends' sake, the chance to speak the commissioner... But this demanded a price... And this price was his life.

He was expecting his opponent had a weapon with him, he had sabotaged the metal detector, so that was not a problem. As for him, instead, he couldn't carry anything, the attendants would have noticed it, and it would have been a real issue for them, most of all because he was a friend of the boys who were above to ask for Rika's freedom, and he didn't want to put them into a rough spot. Moreover, he would have never won in a hand to hand fight, he had always been a puny boy, and he was not able to defeat an adult like that one, a person who was armed, what's more. And, as he had been just told, there were not reliable hideouts, in that huge hall. The rescues would have never come in time to save him.

He had thought about helping the others, but he had forgotten about aiding himself. Yes, Alice and he had always looked poles apart, during all their life, but they had something in common, in the end... They were still brother and sister...

Giancarlo was still staring at him, immobile. Running was useless, it was too late to think about something. And so he could see the man moving the finger to pull the trigger on...

_Alice, wait for me, I'm coming..._

He closed his eyes, weeping.

...

He was forced to open them again. Hearing something like a gust of wind on his face, he turned again at the bomber, just in time to see something hitting the hand with whom he was holding the gun. The weapon fell to the ground, and the man was forced to grasp the aching hand with the other, screaming and flinging abuses here and there, while beginning to stare at someone else, and not at the boy anymore. What had happened? Giancarlo looked to the floor, to see what kind of bullet they had used. There, he saw an object he knew very well.

"That's... my pocket watch, the one I gave to..."

Someone from behind the boy had hurled it against the armed fool, like a pitcher launching his fast ball. Giancarlo didn't know what to think... apart from the fact there was another person, there. An in fact, while the bomber was trying to pick up his gun, a black shadow flew to him, passing some millimeter far to Giancarlo, and it took the man's arm, launching him towards the wall before he could react. He crashed against it, and after a loud scream of pain he stood up again, faltering, trying to see who had dared to commit that outrage.

It was a girl. A young girl with a sportive outfit and a long, green ponytail.

Giancarlo's eyes got widened: "M-M-M-M-M-M-M..."

"It's funny to hear how you're trying to stammer this old lady's name." replied Mion "But a physically weak boy like you shouldn't fight alone against a vile like this. You ought to hire a valuable bodyguard, just like me, don't you think so?"

"H-Hiring you?"

"YOU? WEREN'T YOU ON THAT DAMN BED, YOU BIT..."

Mion turned at the bomber, and her look was enough to scare him, preventing him from finishing the phrase. She was frightening, her eyes didn't let out any light, they were like the darkest obscurity which was in Onigafuchi Swamp, and they were gazing at him like at the prey of a monster. Sure of herself, resolute, and strong. Those were the eyes of a Demon. Those were the eyes of the Queen of Demons.

The man detached his look from hers, unable to face it, and he made a run for the gun, which had fallen again to the ground after Mion's attack. But before he could reach it, someone fired a shot, hitting the floor one centimeter far from the man's hand. He immediately realized he had no more chances to win, and he froze in that position, beginning to cry like a baby and allowing the girl to immobilize him, while waiting for her backing to come with some rope.

A backing who arrived soon. A muscular man, a person Giancarlo had seen seldom, but who was not unknown to him. "You are... Tomitake-san, right?"

"Yes, he is" answered Mion, while the boy picked up the weapon "It was him who told me everything, where they had brought Rika-chan, where you had to go to rescue her, etcetera. Irie-sensei had explained to him the situation, and he has made the same to me. You know, at the Clinic we hadn't met the doctor, I've been told he's still at the Manor with Dad, waiting for a call by you, just in case some of you need something."

Tomitake was not smiling, while they were speaking. As Giancarlo was imagining, Mion had run into him inside Irie's Institute, after waking up. He was there to visit Takano, he had been informed about what had occurred to her, and he wanted to sadly greet her a last time. And so, when he had seen her and he had told her the scenario, Mion had recklessly chosen to ask him to drive her to Ibaraki, to stand with them in that crucial battle, without either informing her father or the doctor (who in fact had not warned the others about this last news). Tomitake wasn't feeling like defying her or making any objection, and they had left instantly Hinamizawa, to join the others before it was too late. Fortunately, to make that trip they had used Tomitake's off-road vehicle, which contained also a sniper rifle in the car trunk, and indeed it had turned out to be useful. Tomitake had been priceless, and that was a relief for him too. Helping the group to save the village was for him a way to atone, for the fact he was not with her loved Takano in the time of need. They had done it, but that was not the moment to be happy for him, now.

"However" concluded Mion, picking up the the boy's watch which was still on the floor and dusting it with her fingers "This belongs to you, I suppose, thank you for lending it to me. It didn't bust because of the impact, luckily."

"It's a quaint resistant watch, from bygone times, they don't build them so sturdy anymore..." replied Giancarlo "But still, you'd better not use the others' goods in this way. Couldn't you avoid to launch this? Affectively, I value it very much."

"I couldn't do otherwise, Mr. Ingrateful" she answered with a sarcastic look "And you know that. I wouldn't have come in time by just running, and yelling him to stop would have been useless. And moreover, I know this watch is important for you, but it's not so worthy as your life yet, I'd say."

"Hmm... Whatever. Anyways" asked the boy "There's something I'd like to ask you..."

"You want to know how we've been able to enter, don't you? The key is the grating of the window out there... If you have time, strength and the proper tools, you can unhinge them, and enter. Tomitake-san gave me a good hand, and also other people did, after that huge explosion. I bet that you have neither heard the glass while we were crushing it..."

"Erm... I fear you're right... You know, my attention had been drawn by something else, they were trying to kill me, actually..." He answered, embarrassed, and Mion started to laugh.

"But I wanted to ask you something else, before" Giancarlo blushed "I mean, when... when did you wake up? And how?"

"Oh, that one... It was this afternoon. I was alone, I wouldn't be able to tell how I have been able to do it..."

"So you had been grasping to be in a coma."

"Yes, but I wasn't able to open my eyes... I was conscious, and at the same time I wasn't... That ATPC was more effective than morphine... And I can't say which process had exactly taken place in my body, to permit me to be here... But..."

"But..."

"But I could sense that in the last days you were keeping my hand between yours, on that bed... You were keeping me warm, and it was pleasant, relaxing. My sleep was better, with that heat... Until you had left my hand. And so, after that moment I was feeling cold, it was not an enjoyable sensation, at all. I feared to be alone, I wanted to move from that uncomfortable position... And after some time I waked up, like a baby who doesn't feel anymore the presence of his mother next to him..."

"So in your opinion you were able to revive because I had gone away, are you saying this? So if I had stayed with you you'd have slept forever... If I had known it..."

"You should stop reprimanding yourself, you couldn't imagine it..." she approached him, and she started to kindly caress his head. It was a familiar scene, for her, but also for him, because that was something they had already seen. That was just like what Satoshi was used to do towards her sister Shion.

"I-inversion of roles?" asked uneasily Giancarlo, who had noticed this detail.

"Why not? Between us, you'd be the perfect wife, and I'd be the perfect husband..."

"Mion!"

"You forgot the honorific _-chan_. You know what calling a person without it means, here."

Giancarlo got red like a tomato, like the shiest of the girls. By calling her _Mion _and not _Mion-chan, _he had just declared she was an extremely very important person for him, and the logical consequence of this was obvious. That might not be the most romantic declaration of love ever happened all over the world, but surely it was the strangest.

"I was kidding." said then Mion, to reassure him "You still must learn a lot about personal relationships, you can't get so embarrassed each time."

"That usually happened to you too, when you had a crush on Kei-chan."

"But today it's different. You're behaving even more awkwardly than me, so I am feeling more at ease, now. However, I won't touch your head in this way anymore, if it gets under your skin."

"No, it's fine, if you want to..." Giancarlo didn't dare to glance at her, while she was keeping on touching his hair. "But... If you like doing this so... I am someone special for you, too..."

"Since that day you gave me back my doll" she sweetly smiled "Do you remember? There are huge differences between Kei-chan and you, we could say you're his nemesis, but among them there was once who moved me. Kei-chan has always aided me only in quality of friend, and nothing else; you instead were clearly caring about me because I was more than a friend, for you... When you had shown me your scars, when you had repaired my doll, when you had tried to boost me... A clumsy boy like you wouldn't find the shamelessness to do that, without a strong reason..."

"Was... it so visible?"

"To me, yes... But I was afraid of what could happen... _Gian, _I didn't want to get disappointed, like that day at the prefecture. I didn't want to be harmed another time, I feared you were not the right person..." Mion lowered her eyes, and it was Giancarlo's turn to try to encourage them.

"Mi... Mion, I understand that. I won't scold you for this... But if you still feel the need to do something else to forgive yourself, we have a great chance. We can stick together, now. Our friends are awaiting us, up there."

"Yes, you're right. We can do it, our club is strong, every member of it is. Including me, including you. If you are able to find the strength not to hurt this old lady neither under the effects of the Syndrome, you must be someone special, in your own way. Am I wrong?" Mion smiled, amused by seeing the boy gazing at her, a bit annoyed by that strange manner to make some compliment.

"Hey, over there! Is everything OK?" asked someone from outside the window.

"Yes, it is!" answered Giancarlo "Please, someone should take this criminal and bring him to the police central, while the others would better go down to the other entrance, and remove all the rubbles which are still there. There are people down at the garage, they need to be assisted!"

Their interlocutor promptly took the bomber, and he left them. Then Mion asked: "Shouldn't we use a ladder to go to the windows on the first floor? If they saw us there they would foresee something important has happened, here."

"No, all the windows of this building are insulated, and there are awnings covering them. They would never be able to notice you. And unhinging the gratings of the first floor would be uselessly dangerous, with just a ladder and no harness. Moreover, now we are not in a hurry, bombs are not a problem anymore. It's far simpler to go to the door leading to them and shifting all the rubble. Once we do it, the fire door will be openable again."

"As you wish." the three began to hold the stones and the pieces of cement, to put them far from the door, but Giancarlo was still absorbed by a sorrowful thought, which was touching his mind. He was endlessly keeping a look over the gun the bomber had let fall, and at the ceiling over his head.

"Mion" he asked, in the end, interrupting their work "Would be so bad if I used this to shoot Goemon-san and if I took my revenge? After what has happened to... to my sister... I know he's a relative of yours, but he's guilty and..."

"Of course it would be bad!" replied Tomitake "Do you want to be arrested because of him? You should neither think about such a..."

But Mion stopped him with a gesture of her arm, and she said: "Gian, you already know the answer, you already know it's wrong. If you were doubtful about that, or if you wanted really to try to kill him, you wouldn't tell it aloud to us, you would keep it secret, wouldn't you? This phrase doesn't represent not your real will, this is rather... a bitter surge..."

Giancarlo's eyes were wet, but he was admitting it. He handed the weapon out to Tomitake, and then he confessed, between one rubble and the next: "Yes, you're right. Goemon-san and Megumi-san will be punished, but not by me. It will be a legal force which is about to stop him, and this is the right way to act. We have defeated all their henchmen, now they are next."

"That's the spirit." Mion exclaimed, before laying a hand on his shoulder. "Ah, by the way... I am sorry for your sister. Truly."

"Alice..." he whispered. "Yes... Alice... I... I..." He stopped to work, looking at the girl. He was tired to lie to himself, he couldn't choke back his crying anymore. And so, he hugged his girlfriend, and pushing his head on her chest he burst into painful tears.

* * *

**Author's note: 11000 words? That's a long one!**

**It's hard to build a solid plot where they really seem trapped... You always think "What if they did this..." But I'm satisfied with the final result. I must say that in this chapter, originally, I had thought about a verbal fight between Giancarlo and the terrorist, a battle where the former says "The bomb won't explode because..." and the latter replied "No, it will explode because..." But in the end I preferred to write it so because I don't know about explosives enough to make a good job (luckily), and because talking fluently doesn't belong to Giancarlo's style, since I've built him so. You know, I had also hypothesized to make him die, to link his fate to his sister's one, but I am not such a cruel guy, finally. :p**

**By the way, 4 chapters left + epilogue...**


	60. Cinderella's dance party

**60 – Cinderella's dance party**

_Ibaraki, 2nd March 1984_

More or less while Mion was making the scene on the lower floor, after the last huge explosion, Sonozaki Goemon was still in the corner he had been told to stay, and he was getting nervous. He knew the guests of the party were to end to arrive at that room at nine o' clock, so the moment of the great bomb was supposed to come after some minute after the closure of the doors. Instead, it seemed that too much time was passing... And he had begun to ask neurotically for the time, since he was carrying no watch, as prisoner. The various answers he received were contrasting, someone had said it was still nine o' clock, someone else rebutted it was already ten past nine, therefore Goemon was hoping his doubts were unfounded. But when it was answered that it was twenty past nine, he concluded that the bomber had failed.

_Damn..._ He knew his servant's nature, he knew he wasn't like the bodyguard, or Nabiha, or Seohara. If they had got him, he would have spilled the beans without creating any problem for himself. The police was about to know about all the things he had done in those months, his period in jail would have been extended by years, he was condemned to never exit from it... Why that man didn't blow up Ibaraki's railroad station, instead of going for the palace they were in now? With that, it would have been harder for them to reach their hometown before it was too late. But that fool had always loved spectacular fireworks, and his ego wouldn't have been happy otherwise... But finally neither his was a good idea, trains are not the only way of transport, and without them it would have been enough for them to rent a car, after the end of the party. Goemon was feeling like losing his self-control, he was doing senseless hypotheses, and shouting at the others when it was only deleterious. He had to stay calm.

He had to find some cop-out. He had to contrive something... But first he had to win that war against those mindless Hinamizawa's protectors. And to do that he had to keep Rika there till midnight, in way of impeding her from leaving and reaching her village before it was too late. Three more hours starting from now, not a minute more than that.

He began to evaluate pros and cons of every possible decision. He had a few minutes to do that, from that corner he could see Keiichi while sprightly explaining their situation to the commissioner. The other participants were observing them as if they were attending a performance, and the policemen next to them looked amused, too. They were considering their whole story like a sort of entertaining show... But maybe that attitude could turn out to be his sake. But he had to find out what to say.

Goemon looked at the commissioner turning towards him and inviting him to leave that corner and to step forward, to rebut to what he had been told. What could he invent? The best choice would be scheming something which couldn't be verified in a quick manner, something which could push them to say _We can't release her because we are not totally sure, for now..._ But what? There was nothing fitting for this, at a first glance. He wasn't expecting to find himself in this situation, and he had devised nothing for that moment.

Biting his lips, he looked at his wife. She was next to him, probably she desired to thwart those mongrels' plan, too, but she was doing nothing. She was there, immobile, wordless, as the most useless of the accomplices. Why hadn't he got rid of her months before? She was a mere annoyance, she had been useful only in quality of element of the Sonozaki family, but she had shown no personal abilities... She hadn't earned his respect. She deserved to die.

"Don't you want to reply, then?" asked again the official, irritated by his interlocutor's muteness.

"He can't" said Keiichi "No falsehood can hide the fact that he's wrong, and he's conscious of that."

"I can, instead" Goemon finally answered, glancing at him like a snake "Give me a second to think about proper words."

"Or to think about a proper fib."

"Shut your mouth and let me have my right to reply." the man said, nervously.

Still, Goemon knew to be in a tricky position and he couldn't find what to say. Inventing a lie and going on sustaining that Rika had tortured Seohara? But that boy was an excellent speaker, his servants had related to him about what had happened during the Landslide War, and in no time that brat would have found the clink in his theory, assisted by his stupid friends. He had to gain time, somehow, and then...

… And then it seemed to him that Keiichi's eyes were getting red, as if they were about to be filled with blood. His look was getting devilishly menacing, it was frightening, but that was absurd, that couldn't be... _What the... _

Goemon shook his head, and when he opened them again everything was back to normality. _A hallucination, then? _He thought _And because of what? Tiredness? Nerves? Fear? _He gnashed his teeth, after that last word.

But none of them could be the right answer... Some other participant inside the hall was massaging his own eyes with his fingers, or acquiring an incredulous glance... Were they having his same experience, perhaps? Had they noticed something unreal on that boy? No, he could hear them while whispering to each other, and talking about different things... Dark shadows, or monsters, or other disturbing things... And they were all a bit scared by the fact that was a group hallucination. _What in the world is it happening? _

It wasn't due to Ouka, she would have certainly informed him if it was, instead that spirit was nowhere to be seen, at the moment. Probably her descendant would have located her if she had been there, so she had preferred to stay out of the matter... Had he abandoned him, like a dog on a freeway, then?

But finally the answer came, from the less expected source. His wife had approached him, and while neither looking at him she said: "Now you know what I made here, while waiting for them..."

"Hmm?"

"Have you seen all those candles on the tables and on the candle-holders fastened on the wall? I... put something special next to that flame, while you were standing in that little corner."

"Something, are you saying? You are referring to that incense, I guess."

"Indeed. With it, you can do whatever you want. Scaring them, destroying their will, convincing the commissioner they are guilty... Take your pick."

"Thank you very much." Goemon answered. Yes, hers was a good idea, she had brought it from Okinomiya, imagining she was going to face her enemies, somewhere... That was their last chance. _Maybe I shouldn't let her die, now she's showing to have some utility. I should find a way to permit her to survive. If I told her about the Syndrome again she wouldn't trust him, so... What about using the ATPC from Mion-san's dead corpse? I'm wondering which blood type Megumi carries. Oh, whatever, we'll deal with it after tonight._

In the meanwhile, Akane had heard her too. And she instantly yelled, disclosing a pinch of panic: "Megumi, had you really used _that_?"

"Ah-ha." her relative just replied, nodding.

"What... are you talking about, now?" asked Rika, while beginning in turn to suffer from convulsions.

"Oh" Megumi said "It's a little trick the Sonozakis have been using from generations, to instill fear into people who have to do with them. Your sleeping friend is probably aware of it, too, but she's not here to describe it to you... What a pity, don't you think so?"

"Akane-san, might you tell us the whole thing? That one is... having fun with mocking us." said Satoko, who was starting to live Rika's same sensations, together with the others.

"It's... ugh... A sort of substance which, if burnt, becomes an odorless mind-expanding gas. Thank Goodness it's substantially harmless but it can produce visions like the ones they and we have just seen... They had been left basically alone, before, we were down with the other guests, so Megumi in particular was free to place it and wait for it to have some effects. Now the air is full of that stuff."

"Can't we just open the windows, then?"

"It's too late, I fear. Even after doing it and beginning to breathe fresh air again, the gas we have already inhaled inside our body will be effective for the next twenty-thirty minutes, this is what the books at the Manor reported. We will have to handle the visions, before claiming to be safe. Be careful, it won't be easy, they won't you give us time to rest..."

"I am not sure to fully understand."

"It's harder to be explain than to be seen. You will get soon what I want to say."

"At least, is that a drug, then?"

"More or less... But it doesn't cause dependence if not used too often, if this is what you want to know. Anyway, the fact we know what it is won't necessarily save us. Megumi certainly knows how to use it, she carried it up to here on purpose, and Goemon must know something about it, too. They will employ it... to force us to attend things we don't want to. In this moment, they are like witches with the power to summon our worst fears, our worst nightmares, our worst memory. All the things which we wanted to remove from our minds, but which are still there..."

"What do you mean?"

"How many doubts... I can tell you this, young lady." Megumi murmured. "By now, you must have breathed it, so we can definitely start..." Megumi had let them talk, that sense of uncertainty would have increased their uneasiness and their agitation, which was good, from her point of view. But now it was time to come into action. She turned at Rena, and she said: "Ryuugu-san, I haven't seen you since before your little accident..."

The brown-haired girl instantly fended, moving a bit back with her wheelchair and rotating it to look at the woman from a three-quarters view.

Megumi went on: "When we had invited your friends to come to Kiyotsu to have a chat with us, you couldn't join them, you were at the clinic in your insignificant village, weren't you? We had talked about you too, that day. We know about your past life in Ibaraki, we know about a lot of things... How often have you talked with them about what's been happening here? I wouldn't be surprised if the answer is _never_... But in this city you did have friends, once. Friends, and reliable ones, but not only..."

Rena looked around herself, with tremulous eyes. Next to her, four figures had appeared. The first three of them belonged to the boys who had tried to rape her, with Seohara's one showing a wounded neck, due to the scratches he had made on it before dying, after the battle against her. The fourth one belonged to Ozaki Nagisa, sister of one of the assailants, and also one of the girl's few friends in Ibaraki. Those pale ghosts were motionlessly surrounding her, staring expressionlessly at the slouchy girl sat on the wheelchair, as the four towers built on each of the corners of a medieval castle.

"In Hinamizawa you were living as if they had never existed, isn't it true? But you can't pretend your past has not occurred. You had never visited them after your departure, you had never left your warm nest, you were scared of making a step outside Hinamizawa, like a little immature baby terrified by the idea to go far from her mommy. Isn't it so?"

"No, it isn't." answered Daijiro, before Rena could. "Would you like to make her feel sorry, as if she was the guilty, and they weren't? If they were really desiring to atone, they would have come to Hinamizawa to see her, or at least they would have make a phone call, to control if they could get back in touch with her. Instead they didn't, and there are two possible reasons for that: they didn't want to apologize, for any motive, or they wanted to remove that experience, to act as if they had done nothing bad. And in both of these cases Ryuugu-san hasn't done anything wrong. If you want to blame something, blame the ones who gave origin to this sort of ghosts here."

"Can... Can you see them too?" Rena opened her eyes wide "I had understood these were hallucinations generated by each of our minds, so mines should be different from yours, we lived diverse experiences..."

"I... can't find any answer to this one... But still, I am able to see them..." Daijiro got slightly embarrassed.

"Oh, I see." Rena smiled "Sharing of the feelings... How cute of you..."

Daijiro blushed a bit: "M... Maybe. Consider that I've seen those guys on the photos on the cuttings you had been sent, and that I've run into Seohara-san in person. But by the way" he pointed at the female image, still there "Who is she?"

"Oh, Nagisa-chan... She's... a relative of one of the three boys, that one exactly. She was one of the very few friends I had in Ibaraki, she was perhaps the only one who was trying to understand me... But frankly I have to admit I didn't give heed at her very much, after my parents' divorce, in that time I was haunted by one recurring thought... finding the way to come back home."

"A friend?" spit Megumi "Surely you were a nice one, for her... You had never contacted her, to tell her what was happening to you, or to ask how she was..."

"It would be nice if we asked you how can you know that." retorted Daijiro.

"It's fine, Daijiro-kun. Indeed, I had never done that, but that's because she couldn't answer me. She died some time ago, a truck had run over her... I was told about it by another officer, working here."

"Might I know the officer's name?" asked the commissioner, getting curious about that case, and wishing to verify it.

"She's a woman, she's called Minai Tomoe... You can ask her for further details, if you're interested in that story. But that's not the point of the matter." Rena raised her head "The point is that you might know that Seohara-san's parents had come to visit Rena, at the Clinic, and they had sincerely apologized for what their son has done, and I really thank them for that. And I am sure that even the ones of the other two boys would do the same, if they were told where I am now. So, why should I delete the past, as you are claiming? This is not true, you know nothing about Rena. Rena accepts it as part of her life, and even if she doesn't retain grudge against them, she still keeps the memory of those facts. And she does it because she wants to have recourse to them, a day, when it's necessary. When my friends are troubled about something, I will avail of the emotions I've felt that time, to better understand them... My life is my most precious resource: the past one, the present one and the future one are all equally important for me. Don't try to make me repudiate a part of my story, Megumi-san, you wouldn't be successful."

To Rena's eyes, Nagisa's spirit looked to kindly smile, happy for the words the girl had pronounced, before all the four figures vanished, while Daijiro was holding her hand as support, and both the youths were gazing at Megumi with resolution.

"And so that would be your brilliant plan, Megumi-san?" commented Satoko "That seems pretty mediocre, to me... Scaring us, you're taking us for kids who still have to grow up. Let's talk about this young lady, then."

Next to her, Teppei's shadow had appeared, and the memory of the past worlds was beginning to turn up from a hidden cleft of her mind, mixing with the one of her present life, even if she couldn't tumble to it. "Unlike Rena-chan, I am not feeling any fondness for the guy by me. But, even if he wasn't intending to do that, he has taught me a lesson, as well. And I'm not talking only about the importance of being independent from Nii-Nii and being a strong person. I know that my Uncle and Aunt were cruel people, but Teppei was also a coward. He desired to come back to my house because he was scared to be harmed by the ones who had killed his lover; at a first glance he was a monster, but he was able to take his anger only on who was weaker than him. And I don't want to be like him."

The shadow on her right vanished, like sucked again far where it couldn't frighten anyone. "I am going to be different. I want to be strong, not to depend completely on Nii-Nii or on someone else. But I want also to clamp down on my strength, when it's the case to do it. Power is nothing without control, they say. In fact, I love to make traps, to tease, to pester the ones I consider friends of mine, but only if they are able to defend themselves. Keiichi-san is a valuable opponent, even if it's basically a stupid villain, and he's in condition to reply to my offensives, so I can usually avail of him, when I'm searching for an opponent. But I would never do it with, for example, one of my youngest classmates, even because it would be no fun."

"Seconded" added Satoshi, glancing at the spectral figure of his Aunt Tamae on his left "And I must say that Satoko's maturation has changed me, too. Now she would be able to live alone, without needing to be sustained by me, or by Shion, who still has always done a lot for her. If she's able to pass over all the difficulties she had met and to become so free-standing and self-confident, why shouldn't I? This is what I told myself, after I had awaken. I am not so clumsy as in the past, I can proudly declare it, I am not nagged by my fears for my sister's health, as some year ago, and this has given me some self-assurance. I had gone as far as giving a real help to my friends, which is a thing I would have never hoped, until some time before. This is something good, don't you think?"

"Yes, I think so." concluded Shion. Next to her, there were two figures: her grandmother Oryou and her sister Mion, with the look they had shown the day when they had forced her to rip her own nails, as sign of distinction. "Once I disliked my clan... But recently I've understood how vital is to defend it, and to take care of its prosperity. And although I had promised I was not going to interfere with familiars affair, I had to break the oath I had made; but Batcha wouldn't have scolded me, if she had been still alive, she would have recognized my good faith. The Tattoo is on Onee's back, not on mine, but it doesn't matter... The Sonozaki family, as well as Hinamizawa itself, is something which belongs to me too, and I must do what is necessary for their sake, don't you agree? Onee, Granny... I miss them, even if I almost hated them years ago... That's why..." she rub a finger on her forehead, as to wipe her own sweat and trace a line with an imaginary marker "That's why we won't let you do what you're trying to do to us..."

The others smiled at her, nodding, while Goemon stared at them, serious. _It's not going well... This is becoming a honeyed life lesson, not an epic fight. It's Megumi's fault... She has chosen the wrong tactic, but in the end offending and attacking the others directly is the only thing she can do well. But let's avoid to go on pitying her... What should I do? We can't scare these brave hearts, they sound to have dealt with a lot of troubles, in spite of their age, but we can scare the others, and the commissioner too... He's the one we have to convince, finally._

"_I must do what is necessary... _You're funny, indeed" he finally replied, addressing his words at Shion "You are talking as if you're the leader of the family, now... Why hadn't you presented yourself as candidate, during the other councils of the clan? You would have got my vote."

"As if I could" she answered spitefully.

"Why don't? You look a girl who loves having some responsibility, in the end. An apprehensive young woman who never forgets anything... And finally Mion-san is your twin sister, have you forgotten that? With another destiny, if only the order of your births had been the opposite, who knows... Has this idea never touched your mind? I don't think so, I wouldn't trust you if you claimed the contrary."

"Please stop kidding, and get to the point." Shion was getting seriously nervous.

"You're right" Goemon grinned, he had had a seemingly good idea. _Ouka is not here with now, she's not going to help us... But with this gas I can still evoke her ghost..." _He made a solemn gesture with his hand, as to uncover something hidden under a sheet, and then he spoke to the little girl who was gazing at him: "Rika-chama, there is someone you should tell us... You know this one, don't you?" His roaring words were enough to make the new shadow be seen by all the participants, and with a whirlwind of blue butterflies the image of Ouka appeared, grinning to the others.

"Very nice." replied the blue-haired girl, without turning a hair "She's not with you in this final battle, and so have you recourse to her ghost?"

"Why not? I don't need her power, I only must show to all of you who is she."

"I... don't understand..." said the commissioner, unable to get the picture, as well as the rest of the other guests.

"It's simple. Ouka-chan, why don't you let them see what you've got in your right hand?"

Rika looked at that part of the spirit, and she got startled. She was holding a sword.

"What is she going to do with that? But that's a vision, not a real object!" shouted Satoko "It can't harm us!"

"Instead it can" answered Megumi "Thanks to the hallucinogen, the sensation of being attacked and stabbed would be so realistic that your instinct, your heart, the irrational part of yourself will not bear with the trauma. You would feel the cold iron penetrating your chest, even if it's not a true weapon... Something inside you will make you say _I'm dead_, and there's no way to avoid that... Or would you rather to try personally it, to convince yourself?"

His wife's comment had given a fatal idea to the husband. Maybe he could do much more than blocking them... Combining that aspect of the substance with his will and with his brain, he could annihilate their own soul, with no chance of mistake. Rika was the most obvious target... And so the ghost he had given birth to started to advance, waving the sword as to wish to slaughter the ones in front of her, while the group compacted, and the other guests were getting frozen, still unable to see something through those unexplainable events, and unsure whether being still safe or not, near to the credible image of a girl rotating a sword.

"Ouka was not so cynical!" yelled then Hanyuu "She had a heart, she still has it, I've taught her to listen to her conscience!"

"Are you that sure? This is the most exact representation of her I could ever do" Goemon replied "I am not a doll maker, I can't make fake versions of people. She's her exact copy, she's how she appeared to me... And her descendant is just like her, she's not better than her."

"That's not true!"

"We can settle this at once."

And Ouka's ghost attacked, shaking its sword as a human possessed by a devil, and pointing it at Rika's neck.

But it was repulsed, with profound disappointment by Goemon. Another ghost had made its appearance, someone able to force the other figure to go back, and it was the clone of someone the group knew very well.

It was Rena's one. Standing with its nata in her right hand, wearing her usual white jacket and hat, and without needing a wheelchair, it had warded off that first offensive.

"Who... Who did..."

"I created it." answered the real Rena. "Earlier, you said we are just like witches with unlimited powers, so I thought that drawing a figure able to defend us was a good idea. But if I've well understood we must refer to images we know very well, something we can draw with precision, so I prefer to use myself..."

"I see. We are like Gods, as far as the effects of the gas stand... That's ironical. Takano-san would have had great fun here, if she had been still alive."

_We are like Gods here... able to change the rules to our liking... _Keiichi repeated to himself.

"Ah, do you think I've got so weak, now?" yelled Goemon. After his exclamation, his ghost seemed to gain strength, and with a second attack it overwhelmed Rena's one, throwing it to the wall, which would have been demolished if the figure hitting it was real. But it was just a phantasm, and it vanished without making any minimal noise.

But the true Rena suffered the blow, as if she had been the one hurt. Feeling the link between the hallucination she had created and herself, she crushed her own chest with her right hand, keeping her mouth close not to let her spit fall down from it. Daijiro promptly aided her, putting a hand on her stomach and helping her not to fall from the wheelchair due to the ache, but still it had been a painful bump. And all, while Goemon was jeering at her. "Have you seen it, now? If a vision of mine hits a vision of yours, you have to undergo the logically consequent pain... And if my blow is sufficiently strong, you can guess the result... This is not a physical fight, this is a duel of minds, this is a duel of wills... And there's no way yours can be stronger than mine."

"Maybe your will is strong, indeed..." the other one barely answered. "... But is it stronger than the one of all of us?" And then the brown-haired girl yelled "Guys, let's join forces! He wants us to play, let's please him! We must put everything we have in another spirit!"

"What kind of spirit?" asked Shion, surprised by her outburst.

"I know it" replied Keiichi, after reflecting for a pair of seconds "Let's think about someone we all know. Someone strong like a God, Someone with infinite powers, Someone who represents perfectly our village and our will of fighting..."

"Ara, I guess to know who are you referring to..."

"Honestly, I don't..." said Daijiro, anxious not to get the idea the others looked to have instantly understood.

"Don't worry, just stay with me, and you'll see it." answered Rena, sweetly smiling and clinging to his hand with hers.

All the youths focused on a steady thought, on a well-defined image. And so, after a violent blast of wind another ghost was summoned. One with red eyes, two long horns on its head, and a traditional black dress. It was carrying the _Onigari-no-Ryuou_, the most sacred of the treasures inside the Furude Shrine. And it has holding it in its hands because it was its legitimate owner. The one in front of Ouka was Oyashiro-sama itself.

"It will be interesting to see how you will counter, when this one disappears in turn." replied scornfully Goemon, seeing what they had created all together "By destroying it, I will harm all of your souls at once, and it will be painful... very painful... You will get desperate, when you realize neither Oyashiro can defend you. You won't find the strength to go on fighting, after that..."

Hanyuu looked at the new phantom, a few uneasy. That image definitely belonged to a man, unlike what she had been in reality. And it was very different from her, it was a taller and older person, with a dark skin tone and thin arms and legs. It was not strange, the others had never known how Oyashiro looked like truly, so they had to invent it, and its aspect was finally only a secondary factor. The fundamental part was the strength and the power it was emanating: its eyes were staring at Ouka's ones, full of decision and desire of protecting its world.

"I wish I had been like that, in my life..." she whispered, in the end.

"You're not that diverse, can't you guess it." replied Rika, keeping on gazing at the two ghosts. "You've contributed to create this vision, so there's a part of your spirit within the one our phantom is now holding."

"But we are not the same."

"Because it's not supposed to be your portrait. This is how the others have always looked at Oyashiro-sama, but the traditional tales don't reproduce the truth by force. You can see how the "Ouka" evoked by Goemon-san hasn't had any reaction, finding itself before the one supposed to be her mother, and while she's holding the sword she had used to kill you, beyond that. The point is that this "Ouka" is just a copy of what our enemy knows about her, it's not a copy of the original one: since Goemon-san is not aware of the kinship between you two, so the ghost on his side ignores it too. Your true daughter must have hidden some info of minor importance, from him."

"I understand... Goemon-san wanted his spirit to be precisely like my little son, but obviously he doesn't know all about her, and so it can be nothing but a fake. The real Ouka can't be far from here, she must have been blowed, after attending this scene. Still, our version of the Monk doesn't seem a powerless God, unlike..."

"And please stop with this litany! It doesn't, indeed. But we must still see if the appearance is equal to the substance. Let's put it on probation."

And then, their duel became a no-holds-barred fight.

"Do you think that..."

"We will find that..."

"And so, what should they..."

"Still, if we're here..."

"The law permits..."

"And why you're making this mess..."

"Because we are..."

"And then, what would you..."

"We will never forgive..."

"Don't dare saying..."

The verbal war between Goemon and the Hinamizawa club took place, with an exchange of questions, answers, remarks and responses. And after each phrase said by one of the disputants, the corresponding spirit gained new strength, absorbing the spiritual force those words were permeated with, and attacked the other one with renewed vigor. Their phrases were like wires governing supernatural dolls, and these reacted in consequence, as expression of the will of their owners. A bite, a stab, a touch. An attack, a parry, a respond, another parry, and finally they started again from the beginning. Ouka and Oyashiro were dancing in the air like kits, each desiring to cut the vital wire of the other, to force it to fall down and to go on flying. All, while their audience was contemplating them, enraptured by that mystical war although they couldn't understand totally what was going on. They weren't siding with any of the two parties, they would have never been able to give a hand to one of them, and they continued to admire the scene, charmed and astonished.

Goemon was able to stand the ground of the whole club, alone. His tenacity and his efforts were commendable, despite his final aim, while his wife Megumi was staying far from action. She was a simple-minded woman, compared to her husband, and she couldn't find the best choices to take, she couldn't elaborate the same words the others could. She was not a speaker like Goemon, or Keiichi, she was far less sharp than Rena, or Satoko, or any other. All she could do was pestering her enemies, insulting them or mocking them, to make them lose control and to rob Oyashiro's figure of some of its energy.

On the contrary, Shion was much more active than her and than her mother Akane, she was like caught by a wild instinct, and she was the one showing the most of the aggressiveness. She considered that old couple as the main responsible for what had happened to Oryou and Mion, and the fear not to see any of them forever was making her behave more boldly than usual. She would have gone on yelling even if she had got mute due to the screams.

However, that duel was getting too long, Keiichi thought. How much they could still resist? Those ghosts didn't seem tired, but the ones who were guiding them were. Under stress, the essence they had breathed might make them faint all of a sudden, or have worse effects, which would have been a bad thing. Akane was not the leader of the Sonozakis, maybe she hadn't been told everything about that essence, and they had to avoid bitter consequences. Moreover, that fight wasn't looking to be about to end shortly, and time was playing against them. On the score of their sense of excitement due to the cloud of gas, their perception of hours and minutes was likely falsified, and if midnight had arrived without they being able to notice it... He had to find some trick...

"I am tired of you! Are you going to surrender, or not?" asked Goemon.

"The most idiot question ever. Congratulations!" replied the boy, contemptuous.

"Oh, really?"

"Sure. Look at our phantom, over there." Oyashiro's sword started to launch bursts of fire. "That figure represents not only the souls of the ones you're seeing here, but also the ones of who is elsewhere, of who is still in Hinamizawa, and of who had lived there in the past years and ages. We are not alone, Mion's here, too, Giancarlo and Alice are, Kimiyoshi and Kasai are, Takano and Irie are, Tomitake and Akasaka are... And all the others are... This is the core of the Spirit of our village, and Oyashiro-sama is Hinamizawa's Spirit itself, as He has always been."

"Have you forgotten the feud among the Sonozakis? Some of the ones questioning Mion-san's role comes from Hinamizawa, too. Your horrid hamlet is not so united as you're making us believe."

"They are behaving so in good faith, they are not planning to cause a catastrophe like what you're doing. We will take our time and we will explain everything to them, once this story is over, and they will be happy to be convinced by us."

"Your naiveté is so touching... You know, for each thing you can imagine, there is something which can cancel it. Observe there, and learn from this." Ouka's sword got wet, as if it was dripping water from the metallic blade. "These are the symbols of our souls, Keiichi-san. Yours is overwhelming and tempestuous like fire, mine is calm and regular like an ocean. But if you put flames and water in contact, which of them is about to win?"

"Water, of course." answered Megumi, chortling.

"That's the right answer... Nature is a mirror of human emotions, passion never lasts for a long time, on the contrary of rationality and good judgment. There is often a very strong bond between us and the environment around us. But let's find it out for the umpteenth time, do you like this idea?"

The other boys got worried by their enemy's confidence, and they tried then to convert that fire into something else, but they couldn't. Keiichi's strong will was preventing them from doing it.

"Kei-chan" said Shion, noticing it "What are you doing? Are you going to accept his challenge, perhaps? Please, don't be so stubborn, for once..."

"Do you believe in me?" he only answered.

"Kei-chan..." the green-haired girl didn't know what to do, but she finally said: "Very well, guide us. We'll follow you."

"I AM TIRED OF YOU, I'VE TOLD YOU ONCE!" Goemon yelled "THE GAME IS OVER! DIE, GET THE HELL OUT OF HERE, STUPID PHANTASM, AND DRAG THEIR SPIRITS TOGETHER WITH YOU!"

Ouka's lunged against them and against Oyashiro, with a ferocious glance... The Monk had to block it, or it would have hit the others, and it raised its burning sword, against the other blue one. Immobile, it was awaiting the blow.

Which arrived.

Despite they were only spirits, the force of the blow was so strong that the wall were intensely shaken, making them afraid of be swamped by the collapse of the building. The lamps and the candle-holders inside fell from tables and walls, and a blinding light reached the eyes of who was in the hall, and they were all forced to close them for a second. And when they opened them again, they instantly realized who was the winner. That duel was not real, after all.

And in fact, fire had been able to burn water, running along its flow, and Ouka's image was now surrounded by flames, until it disappeared, defeated.

Goemon cried in pain because of the repercussion he got subjected to, while the club exulted and Megumi could do nothing but gazing at him lost; and so, kneeling the man looked at the boy in front of him. "What... What..." he stuttered, while also the Monk's image vanished quietly and painlessly.

"You made a mistake, finally... I am not only an impulsive guy, I have a brain too... You know, it has taken a lot of time, but in the end I'm starting to comprehend how to use this gas... Because since the beginning ours have been just visions, Goemon-san. Real world obeys to defined rules, for example objects have necessarily to stand leaned on earth, and not on the sky, living beings need each day some food to survive, and so on. Water having the upper hand on fire would be usually another incontrovertible truth, but not here... All those figures didn't belong to the real world. That's because these exhalations can unleash also our imagination, and if I want to overturn this, it's enough to make my will stronger than yours, which desires to make the rule itself stand. Have you realized that you will _never _defeat us? You are rational, like most of aged people I know, but your fantasy is much less developed than ours. Furthermore, we are more than you, you are getting more tired than us, as you were saying before. Less energy, minor ability, weaker overall will... How much longer do you want to fight?"

"I... I... I don't want to..." the old man stood again, ready to summon another ghost. But it was blocked by an unexpected hand.

"Sonozaki Goemon-san, please stop." said the commissioner "We've seen enough. You have fought a reliable battle, now admit your loss. Let's recognize to these boys the group their deserved prize. They were asking for their little friend's release, weren't they."

"No, you can't, I am still able to..."

"Your point of view won't change mine, I'm sorry." the official replied "I am not obliged to follow your guidance, and I think that, if these foreigners have undertaken such a prominent duel, they did it for a good cause."

"So we are free to go?" exclaimed Satoko. "Please, could someone tell us what time is it?"

Hearing this, one of the guests checked his pocket watch. "It's... half past nine."

"Wow, so early? We won't be in a hurry, either. I have to confess that far more time had seemed to pass, to me..."

"I suppose it was due to that substance, again." explained Akane "Now, can someone open finally those windows? That would be a real politeness, by you."

An attendant forthwith obeyed, and the woman thanked him, without noticing what was happening behind her. Goemon was still on his knees, his desire to fight had definitely vanished and he had started to weep, but he wasn't alone. A couple of steps far from him, Shion was holding a candelabrum, keeping it like a stick.

She was looking at him, and grasping her presence Goemon raised his head, running into her angry eyes.

"Now it's over..." she said slowly, while her hand were trembling "The others are safe, at least... But because of you, Onee... Onee is still..."

"Shion, what are you doing?" yelled Rika, beckoning everyone's attention.

"DON'T POKE IN THIS! I CAN'T FORGIVE HIM!" the green-haired girl shouted, to keep them stay distant from her.

"Shion, stand back at once!" said then Akane "He's still a member of your family, bring some respect to him! He's not going to frustrate us anymore, and there's no need to attack him beyond."

But she didn't give heed at her. "I... I... I am not like you, like Onee, like Batcha... I don't want to show mercy. Because of him, Satoko had risked to die, and Onee is going to never wake up... I can't let him go... I CAN'T..." she raised her improvised weapon, on the verge of hitting to death. Her eyes were getting dark, overflowing with all the wrath she had been compelled to repress until that evening. Her instinct would have never allowed her to stop herself in time, while Goemon was neither giving any hint of reaction, he was motionless and stooped as if he was accepting that fate, or even better as if that was the fate he was now wishing for himself. And the others were too far from the girl to block her move.

But a simple word was able to do it. "Shion."

The youth turned her head, stopping the movement of her weapon, towards the one who had said it. "Sa-Satoshi-kun..."

"This war is over, please keep yourself from doing this."

"But... I can't..."

"Shion, don't waste your life for him. What will happen to you, and to me as well, after his death? Nothing good will occur, and the only result would be your arrest. Let the police take care of him, life sentence will be a satisfying punishment, for him."

"You... You're right... As usual... I always need your calmness..." Shion began to sob, and she delicately laid the candelabrum on one of the adjacent tables, while the commissioner was giving orders to some official present as guests in the hall, in way of taking Goemon and Megumi into custody. She couldn't know yet how her boyfriend's words had been wise: her sister was to come there in a few minutes, once she and the ones with her had finished to remove the last rubbles from the fire door, and the two siblings would have been finally able to hug themselves, after all those troubling days.

That long scary war was substantially no more.


	61. An end without praise or blame

**61 – An end without praise or blame**

_Ibaraki, 2nd March 1984_

"So, basically, you did it without this old lady's aid..."

Mion was grousing. She hoped to have a part in the final showdown, her wounded pride required it, but when she had been finally capable to clear the path to the first floor, the duel was already over. So, after the unavoidable queries about her state of health, all she could do was muttering, due to the fact they had left her behind.

"Tsk" replied Shion "If we had waited for you, Onee, they would have cooked us with fried potatoes and soy sauce."

"Very funny. You know, I was already figuring one of those showdowns where the hero suddenly appears from the top of a skyscraper, or out of a powdery hole in the wall, well-lighted with proper beacons and accompanied by a reliable soundtrack..."

"So banal. And in that manner you would have reduced us to the role of background actors, despite what we had to stand until now... You are so ungrateful when you do so, Onee."

"Do you want a punch in that maggoty head of yours, Shion?"

"Don't be angry with Shii-chan, there's no need to do that." said Rena "In the end, we are a united group, where all the members have courage in abundance, and in clubs like ours the role of leader is less important than in others, we can all manage to make our part. And furthermore, your spirit was together with us, wasn't it? Wasn't it?"

"Well... I don't know if I can be that happy of it, but let's just forget about this. However, have we to do something else, here in this hall? I don't think we can waste a lot of time here."

"You should ask to that man over there." Keiichi pointed at the commissioner, who answered, being dragged in by that odd discussion: "You are a weird group, had nobody told you?"

"We're just what we are, and what we've always been. So long as the circumstance prevents us from having formalisms, we preferred to focus on the substance. But rather, shouldn't you give us a certain permission? Sorry, but we are quite in a hurry."

"I can't see why you are so, and I've not understood why you were so busy to ask us to let you go immediately, yet, but I don't mind. You have offered to us a great show, tonight, and with the recording of all those cameras down there we shouldn't need more inquiry. Moreover, that man they have brought here will soon confess everything, and we'll discover what we still must discover. You are free to go whenever you want."

And the audience clapped, while Keiichi was glancing at them a few uneasy. The participants to the party and the commissioner himself too had accomplished what they demanded, but they didn't seem to be good people. Hearing them, and looking at the attitude they had shown during all the ceremony and also after it, it seemed that they had fulfilled their requests not because they were thinking they were legit or because they had concluded it was the right thing to do, but because they had staged that entertaining fight. From their point of view, that was not an act of justice made to a citizen, but a sort of fee given to a company of actors. The promoters of the party had used them and their story to give to their guests some solace, as an original and amusing way to pass the evening. _Now I understand why Rena didn't want to stay here anymore... _But finally, he didn't intend to change the way they were considering them. The most important thing was that they were letting Rika go, and therefore he didn't insist.

"So" exclaimed Satoko "What will happen now? The final meeting of the Sonozaki family has still to take place in some day, even if those two won't participate..."

"Oh, I wouldn't be worried if I were you, in your own words you can find the answer to your doubt." Akane explained "The gathering to discuss about the leader of the clan won't be canceled, but without the main opponents I don't think that somebody will go on questioning Mion's role. Mom has chosen her, and that's all, nobody will go against her will and against tradition, and so she will be certainly confirmed."

"Excellent news."

"Indeed." added Mion "Apart from Uncle Goemon and Aunt Megumi, the others who didn't want me as their chief will receive my forgiveness. I've known them since I was quite a little girl, and they are not bad relatives, I guess they did it in good faith, only because they have been misled by these offenders."

"And what about the two excluded ones, instead? Namely, what about the two offenders, as you're calling them?"

"Well... there isn't much this old lady can do for or against them, frankly. A lot of charges weigh on them, and the police will take care of everything, and they will freeze everyone else out, except for who will decide to denounce them or to bring a civil action in this criminal proceeding, but personally I'm not feeling like doing it, at the moment. Moreover, consider that they neither want to hear the words _apology _and _forgiveness, _this is what I'm thinking."

"You're right... Well... at least I will be brought far from you..."

Everyone turned at Goemon, who had told those last words, and then Rika said: "Do you really want to die, you fool?"

"Yes... I am about to be condemned, but I will be sent to Ibaraki's prison, far from Hinamizawa, and the strain due to my defeat will free me from this torture... My plan might allow me to survive, if I managed to win, but now I don't want to keep on living with dishonor."

"So yesterday you were bluffing, when you had been saying you weren't scared of staying in jail for some time."

"I neither want to answer to this."

"Can someone tell me what's this story?" asked the commissioner, annoyed "You had been talking about death and emergency all the time."

Rika was doubtful. Had she to narrate him the whole issue? He could give them some nuisance, if they had hidden it from him, he was a powerful authority. But before she could open her mouth, the man went on speaking: "Oh, well, I don't matter. The only interesting part is that he doesn't want to stay near to you anymore, but we must punish him, somewhat... So, I have an idea..."

"What kind of idea?" a terrible wariness came into Goemon's head.

"Well, you committed your last crime here in Ibaraki, since you were trying to take our lives, but most of the other ones have been perpetrated within Okinomiya's district, like the torture you used to torment the boy named Seohara-san. And you come from that zone of the country, moreover. So, why should you be judged here, and not there? I was told there is a brand new structure thereabouts, built recently not far from the palace of the prefecture. They will be glad to welcome you, you will be sent to the prison of your hometown as soon as bureaucracy permits. It's more comfortable than any other solution, for most of us."

"WHAT?" the old man yelled "No, you can't do that!"

"Why not?" answered the commissioner "You seem not to want to go there, maybe because there is someone else who has to settle a score with you, there. Consider this first punishment as a gift by me. Criminals must suffer because of their guilts, don't you agree?" There was a bit of sadism, in that man.

As for Goemon, he knew that the official wasn't prattling. They really would have bought him to Okinomiya, to be taken to trial and locked. He would have never left that place, which meant he would have always been near to Hinamizawa, and to Rika. He wouldn't have gone far enough to see the final symptoms of the disease turning up on his body. He was cursed, his damnation was to stay in prison for years, without hoping for a quick and sweet death. That fate was horrifying, he would have never managed to bear with it. All those monotone days, obliged to live together with his remorse, and with his regrets... Without a chance to redeem, or at least to take revenge... He couldn't stand with it.

"No, this is not the ending I've designed for myself!" he shouted, out of his mind "I wanted a victory, a triumph! I don't want to fall into that oblivion! If I have to lose, I want an adequate defeat, not one like this. I'd like to die, rather."

"What the heck is he getting, now?" commented his wife coldly, in the dark of what that decision really meant.

Goemon didn't hearken to her either, and she went with milling steps towards Shion. His eyes were wide open, the outlook suddenly appeared in front of him was terrifying him, and he wanted to dodge it at any cost. So he yelled: "You, you wanted to kill me, before, didn't you? Very well, then, take a heavy object, grab the one you were holding before, and do what your instinct was suggesting! Come on, do it!"

Shion didn't answer. She was just looking at that pathetic being, with a certain compassion. She was pitying him. Even though he wasn't noticing it, insanity was slowly getting control of his mind, and the wretched man could do nothing but going on attempting to provoke everyone, to make them lose their temper, hopelessly.

"You, why don't you hate me? Are you stupid people, unable to hate? It's not possible! You, I've made you a paraplegic girl... Your boyfriend and you ought to do something to get even with me... And you, I've killed your sister, how can you stay so calm and insensible? My servant had a gun, use it... And you, your father will never come out of his jail, thanks to me, aren't you furious against me? And you, I've ruined your life... And you... And you... And you..."

"It's getting lamentable, please take him out of here." whispered the commissioner, tired to listen to his rigmarole. And at once two policemen obeyed, grabbing him by his shoulders and dragging him to the door of the hall, while the man was screaming and drooling.

"Ouka! Bring me far from here! You can't let them do this to me! Give me a second chance! Please, Ouka! Ouka! OUUKAAAA!"

The Syndrome might not to strike him, but his mind was destined to plunge towards damnation, forever.

_He can't accept to go on living, simply _thought Rika _I would have liked to stand in front of him and declaring "Checkmate, man", but I didn't want to rub salt into his inner wounds. I dread his last Fate is to go anyway crazy, even if not due to the disease. The parasite is not going to kill him quickly, still he doesn't want to pass his life in jail, so madness is the only manner left to him to escape from that future he detests so heartily... _She approached the official and she said: "I can't sincerely say whether I'm doing a favor to Goemon-san or not, but I must ask you to take care of him, please. I fear he will try to commit suicide, in the future."

"We'll handle him, don't worry. We won't permit him to run away from his faults."

"Thank you. By the way, what about Megumi-san? Will she be led to Okinomiya, too?"

"Quite probably. She is not so afraid of her destiny as how her husband is, but their charges are identical, their case is the same, they both will be judged by one trial, then. It would be more expensive to take another choice."

"I understand. A last thing, then. I must ask you not to tell what has happ..."

"And why should they keep their mouth shut?" Keiichi interrupted her. "There is nothing bad in what has taken place here, and everything has a logical explanation. Everyone here is conscious those visions were not real ghosts or spirit, they were only on the score of a hallucinogen gas. They know we are ordinary people and not dangerous witches, and there are not mysteries and secret details to hide. There is nothing which can concern you, even if told to the others."

Rika gazed at him. He was right, the point was she was used to conceal everything which could seemed linked with the mystical sphere or with any plot, like the existence and the identity of the one known as Oyashiro-sama, the Hinamizawa Syndrome, Ouka's appearance, and so on. _I should change myself, one of these days._

There was not much else to say, then. According to the tale of the day before told by Goemon, his wife was still developing the Syndrome in her own body, but in case of emergency Mion could use her blood as cure, just like what she had done with Satoshi months before, the two women were relatives and they had the same blood type. She would have not died, and they would have continued to keep an eye on Goemon's position, too. So, since it was already ten o' clock in the evening, they quickly waved everyone and they flung down to Tomitake's means of transport, to fly to the police central and inform Kimiyoshi and Kasai that everything was over, now. They still had a couple of hours, to leave that big city and start their trip back to their village.

Along the way, however, Keiichi was having a doubt: "Rika-chan, can I ask you something?"

"Please do. Now we have time to dispel all the remaining matters, so it's not a problem anymore, for me."

"Well... You had talked us about that spirit, Ouka... But she didn't show herself up, in the end. Beware, I am not saying you were a liar, before, when you had told us she was present too: we all have heard Goemon-san shouting her name, while they were bringing him away, calling her as if she could rescue him, but at the same time as if she had betrayed him... Why she didn't do anything, in the end, in your opinion?"

"Rena would like to know it, too..." the brown-haired girl seconded him. "We were not alone, in that hall, I could sense somehow another presence, but I couldn't see it..."

"I... can't answer to this question, really... But don't worry, we are not in danger anymore, now..." and while saying that, she closed her eyes, imitated soon by Hanyuu.

"Rika-chan? Hey, Rika-chan?" said Keiichi, softly jostling her. But she didn't open her eyes again, she didn't say a thing. She was looking alike fallen asleep.

Hence, Keiichi wanted to awake her, but Satoko scolded him: "Let her rest, she must be exhausted. If you want to make some other query to her, wait for tomorrow, at least."

…

But in reality, Rika was not completely unconscious, in that moment. With her mind, she had gone with Hanyuu back to the Saiguden. It was very late, and the place was very dark, but a burning candle was telling them that someone was awaiting them.

"Good night, Ouka" Rika began, with the air of someone wanting to mock her interlocutor. "Did you like our show?"

"Rika, please be kinder with her. Dear, how are you feeling?"

"Quite well, Mom, thanks..." the spirit murmured, softly. Neither Rika nor Hanyuu could tell how Ouka was. She didn't look happy, or pleased, or angry, or sad, or exhausted, or disappointed. The only emotion she was letting shine though her face was some disorientation. And in fact she added: "Mother, and you too, Rika... Could you reveal to me what's the last meaning of this?"

"What do you want to be told about, exactly?"

"About the sense of what you and I have done on this world during all these centuries. To me, it seems we are still back to the square one. People are still obliged to have recourse to their own sacrifice, to save the others, like what that boy was on the verge of doing just tonight, on the low ground of the hall. And I'm certain that the others would have done the same, during their last duel with Goemon-san. So, why? Has my efforts been useless? Have they understood nothing, in all this time, during all these centuries?"

"You wanted to see how we were about to fight, tonight, that's why you didn't intervene..."

"Indeed. I got so astonished, seeing how your group seems to work pretty well, harmonious and integrated in your world, in how it works, even if it presents this enormous flaw; you were so in tune with it that I didn't have the bravery to destroy you, I would have been wrong if I had done it, at least this is how I was feeling like. But still... I can't accept this kind of world can be thought as the best ever possible. A world where someone dies to make someone live. A world guided by rational people shouldn't be like a jungle, where nothing but the law of the fittest rules..."

"Ouka, don't come to hasty conclusions, now. Please allow me to make a distinction: we don't like to see our friends while sacrificing themselves for our sake, get it into your head. On the contrary, we are sad each time they are compelled to suffer because of us, or because of any other man, and we do everything we can to give them another way to do it. But we have also taken the choice to accept this, as sign of their will. We can't blame who does it, we can't say it's his fault; at most, we can scold ourselves for forcing him to do it, but I fear this is unavoidable, in certain cases. We know that idyllic worlds will never exist, and that you have to renounce to something, in order to have something else or to give it to the ones you love."

"I am aware of this, Mother. If the cause is fair, I can endure that people go through pain and trials, I even approve it. But still, this should go only when the sacrifice is passable, not excessive. Wasting your own life is a too expensive price, for any thing you can desire for you or the others. This is what I'm refusing."

"Ouka, we understand you're saying this because you're a good person, deep-down, but as I have just told, we can't oblige the others to behave like we want. We are not puppeteers controlling their inanimate dolls, we can't tell them what to do. They are responsible for their own acts."

"So, nothing from the past has changed, after all these years?"

"It's not true, Ouka" explained Hanyuu "There's something which is totally different. In that time, all Hinamizawa wanted me to commit suicide. They hated their neighbors, and themselves too, because they didn't like to have demonic blood into their veins. They were scared not to be normal, like every other human, they feared to be monsters and they couldn't accept themselves. That's why they hated me, they didn't want to see me alive anymore, and my sacrifice was something they were heartily desiring. Now, instead, nobody wants anybody to die, among us. They care about their friends and companions, and even the poorest and more marginalized inhabitant of the village is not left alone. This is the best result of our battle – and of the one you fought in the past, too."

"That's not a great result."

"It is, instead. The role of a leader, and of people like you and me, is not to make mankind happy. We are not powerful Gods, as you had reminded me not a long time ago, but we are neither completely useless: we can do a thing for our community, and that is letting them search for happiness. Giving them the chance to do what they want, within reasonable limits, and allowing them to find their way. If we drove them to desperation because we forbid them to save us, we would commit an even more severe guilt, because anguish and remorses would seize their mind."

"I... don't understand..."

"Ouka, we don't want to lord it over. Neither of our views of the world is perfect, we're conscious, but I must tell you that the one we carry in our heart brings more happiness and a better existence than yours, in the end. Please, let us live how we like, this is the only praise we're asking you for."

"The only one... You don't want to a punishment for me, then... Are you letting me go, although I was the one behind Goemon and Megumi? Aren't you punishing me?"

"I don't deem there will ever be a policemen who puts you under arrest, my dear Ouka, nor there will ever be a jail which can contain you. Moreover, punishment is a deterrent, a manner to make people not repeat their mistakes, but I've realized it's not necessary for you; and you should also know I've never had the power to affect the state of a spirit in a way, so I couldn't condemn you even if I desired it."

"But the point is that you neither want it, Mother."

"Indeed. You are my daughter, and you will always be, but that's not the sole motive. You didn't made Goemon and Megumi bad people, they already were. They would have anyway done what they have done, sooner or later, this was the role written for them by destiny. They couldn't go against their fate, and they didn't want to go against it either. Their will is not like Keiichi-san's one, so don't reprimand yourself for what you had made towards them. Furthermore, I like to think that the evil Ouka has been just defeated some minute ago, with that odd duel against our opponents. I know they were just visions and hallucination, fully unrelated with you, but let's consider it a ritual punishment, just like the Watanagashi: that mattress Rika pieces out every summer is not directly linked with humans' sins, clearly it's just a very common piece of furniture, but that ceremony expresses their desire to improve themselves, and our villagers do feel better and purer, after its conclusion."

"And will it be sufficient, for me?"

"I wish for that. If you feel the need to get another penalty, you could wear strange and humiliating clothes, or paint your own face... In our club we always do that, and that's not a light punishment at all, I can vouch for it."

"You've got queer in all these years, Mother..."

"I know it, Ouka."

And Hanyuu stopped speaking. She had nothing more to say, and she was glancing at her daughter, beaming at her. She would have liked to hug her, but the other one was in a spiritual form, and so it was not possible. Anyways, both of them were aware of the other's emotions, and that was enough for them. All their resentment had no motive to exist anymore, and it had pacifically vanished.

"Hmmm... I have not been convinced by your weird ideas, yet..." commented Ouka, finally "But I guess you're getting a point. All right, I will give you a chance. Do what you please, I will keep an eye on you. And if you get happy... Well, I will recognize it."

"You are not going to admit your fault, are you?" remarked Rika.

"Nope. After all, I'm still your ancestor."

And Ouka smiled relieved, before her soul left the Saiguden, towards the serenity she was searching for so much. It was such a comfort for Hanyuu, she was hoping her daughter to be finally happy, after her earthly life and the one she had lived until now. Rika, instead, closed her eyes again, letting her spirit fly, free to reflect about that strange but fascinating world.

...

_This is the end, in the end... _

_Wordplays apart, we did it. The last council among the elements of the Sonozaki clan won't be a real issue, they will end it in less than five minutes. Mion will be confirmed as ruler of her family, though being under observation for a certain amount of time: she hadn't __got her pulse on the whole story, that's an indubitable truth, but __that one will probably be the only condition they will ask her. Their concern was not fully senseless, it was understandable, but nobody of them is really questioning her actual position. Everything will run fine._

_About the Syndrome... Well, now that there are not impelling matters Irie can work on the vaccine with more calmly. Mion is stronger than ATPC in her blood, she has demonstrated it by awakening before it was too late, and she can live with it unless it's under control, which will be soon, as the doctor had announced to us some time ago. And so, before the beginning of summer that damned parasite won't exist anymore, and it will cease to torment our bodies and our souls. Mion's blood will cure the old disease... and Giancarlo's one the new one, just in case someone appears with those symptoms, for example if some other "experiment" crops up, after being kept hidden for several months by Goemon. Irie might even use the antibodies that boy's organism has likely __generated, they would be a precious resource, but this decision belongs to the medic, not to me._

_Finally, a lot of couples have been formed during this stormy years. Shion and Satoshi, Rena and Daijiro, Mion and Giancarlo... Their unions will last ages, I guess, they have already sustained incredibly hard obstacles, in these last months, and there's no reason to think they won't survive to the ones they are about to run into, in their future ordinary days together. However, it's funny to see how actually Keiichi has been left alone, although there were two girls in our group who were getting mad for him, and many others outside. Oh, well, he's a charming boy, he will soon find someone. _

_Anyways, I'm disappointed. Not by Goemon's and Megumi's end, they have got what they deserved. But by the one reserved to many others. Nabiha and Seohara, Alice, and Takano. And Rena's handicap, too... They have made mistakes in their lives, like every normal person they are not infallible, but they have also paid the price for someone else's guilt. We've just told to Ouka that this is not an ideal world, but sometimes I like to forget human nature, and to wonder why we can't be all happy..._

_And I can't be sure whether this is a good ending or not. We can't say "We're living happily ever after", because that wouldn't be true. But I suppose real stories always end so, this was not a fairy tale. But I accept this. This is an ending, that's all. And as Rena had told me once, we must look for happiness in the world we have in front of us, with its problems and its limits: this is the only world we have, so we must live with it. _

_I know, it sounds so absurd, told by me, but this is real. This is our only world, shared with all the other people, this is our little personal heaven made of crystal, a place where people have to fight everyday to build their own beatitude, and we can't waste it. Let's go on cultivating it like a garden of roses, and let's appreciate the result we reached with fatigue, whatever it is. Because, by absurd, the outcome of our life is not the most important thing, when you take stock of it. The most important thing is how you get it, it is the road and the sacrifices you've made to reach it, and how much you are satisfied with it, and with yourself._


	62. Bonds to deal with

**62 – Bonds to deal with**

_Hinamizawa, 21st June 1984_

This year's Watanagashi was over, and so was the Hinamizawa Syndrome.

Two or three weeks before the festival, the medic had finally managed to put together the final version of the vaccine, and he had administered it to the whole community, aided by the Three Great Families who had been fundamental in reassuring the population, claiming it was a precautionary drug against the next wintry flu. To tell the truth Kiichiro Kimiyoshi didn't know what the real purpose of the injection was, and he couldn't figure why that serum was so crucial, but he had seen how much Mion Sonozaki and Rika Furude were caring about it, and so he decided to join their efforts. If they held it so important, there was no reason for him to disagree with them, and furthermore he considered himself still in debt with Mion.

Everything had run well, apparently. They couldn't check the real effectiveness of the vaccine, unless someone left the village for a while, but the medic was faithful and proud of his product, and then nobody was worried about the true value of his research. Irie had made it just in time: not more than a week after, he was communicated that, starting from the beginning of the following month, he was officially dismissed from the charge of director of the Clinic, called to that day with his name. The direction and the new owners of the structure hadn't appreciated the fact he lodged patients for free, although they were friends of him and kept down in the basement. The medic found they were heartless people, but he didn't gave the look to mind about that. That Clinic had made the task it had been built for, in the end.

That was why Satoshi and Shion were there, in that place. They were helping Irie to put order in all his stuff, before bringing it away from his office. The doctor wished to put them in his home, but his apartment was not big enough to host all those documents and books, so they had to organize themselves, to choose what they could take and what they were compelled to throw away. The rest of the club had still to help the villagers to disassemble the stands and all the scaffoldings they had used for the Watanagashi, which had taken place four days before: they couldn't do it before because the previous days had been all heavily rainy, even though the night of the festival itself hadn't, thank Goodness, and so Irie had asked only to a couple of them to assist him, guessing they would have been anyway enough.

Hence, the two youths were alone, Irie had been substantially fired but he had still to work for the owners of the Clinic till the end of June, so they could speak without fearing about being disturbed, and they were talking about things they would have never revealed if they had been in a larger group. Especially Satoshi was doing it, Shion was rather wordless in that moment, what was happening lately hadn't made her happy. In fact, the boy laid on the table adjacent to him a heavy box full of reports, and abruptly he confessed: "It's quite absurd, but I miss my old life..."

"Is that so?" she answered distractedly.

"This is how I am feeling like... Some time ago, I had to think about Satoko, to protect her everywhere she went. Keeping on watching over her was stressful, tiring... but it was gratifying, too. It permitted me to consider myself useful, I had something to do, and that prevented me from drowning into boredom and apathy..."

"I've never heard you talking so melodramatically, Satoshi-kun."

"He he, these words belong to Rena-chan, not to me... She had said them to me some day ago during the Watanagashi, when we were next to the platform where Rika-chan was doing the ceremony."

"Hmmm... I don't remember to have heard her while saying it... Rena-chan and you were _alone_, then..." said Shion, whose eyes were showing a pinch of jealousy.

But Satoshi got where she was pointing at, and he laughed. "Sorry, Rena-chan is a wonderful girl, but she is not my type. However, we are free to chat with our friends, from time to time."

"I... I'm sorry, I didn't intend to... The point is that in the last days I'm not in an ideal mood, because..."

"That's all fine." With a comforting smile, he leaned a hand on her hair, making it glide along it. Shion imagined he might already know everything about the most recent unfoldings, even though that was not possible, but she didn't find the will to end her sentence, so she let him keep on: "Still, what she had told me corresponds with truth, I find. Now that Satoko is grown and independent, I'm feeling like something is missing... In my last years, I did nearly nothing but protecting her, making certain of her sake and her health. But now, what can I do? She doesn't necessitate my aid, and of course neither you do, at most the opposite is true. So, I had to search for something else, something who could let me feel useful, and in this last period I had thought about joining a baseball team, but no serious society would ever hire me. I started to train myself too late, to become a valuable player."

"So?"

"So, I concluded that I should do what I can do the best. Taking care of someone, giving a moment of peace and stillness to the needy one. I have quite a lot of experience, in that field, I wouldn't be a newbie at all, I would be better than lots of people who have studied in some university. And there's a place where I can do it, close from here."

Shion mumbled for a second, and then she answered: "Okinomiya's _Child Consultation Center_..."

"Yes. Once I have the minimum age, I'm going to apply for a job inside that structure, I hope they will accept it."

He was going to work for the ones who didn't want to rescue Satoko, in other worlds... There was something bizarre in that idea, and Shion got it, even if vaguely. "But from their point of view you have no curriculum vitae! For them you are a boy with no competence, not grown yet!"

"I will try again, and again. I can be pretty obstinate, if I want."

And he truncated the dialogue, grabbing a new pile of books and sheets, to be brought outside. Shion contemplated him while he was going over the door, and she whispered: "So, you're desiring to take care of someone else, Satoshi-kun. You love responsibilities..."

…

That evening, another young couple was alone. Daijiro was leading Rena to home, pushing gently her wheelchair while walking. They had time to discuss, and their actual frames of mind were different. The one driven was serene and quiet, happy to have come back to the peaceful life he had always adored; the one driving, instead, was consumed by seeds which had been planted in his mind for some day. It didn't took much time before the girl noticed it, and she looked for the reason, turning her head and smiling.

"Daijiro-kun? What's going on, what's going on? You are dour, dour..."

"Well..." the boy would have liked not to answer, but in that few time he had spent with her he had already realized it was senseless to hide things from her.

"I'm... concerned."

"About what?"

"About my father. I hoped there was some chance for him, still... He doesn't look to atone for what he had done. If he understood what he was about to make to all of you, his period in jail would me more serene, we could pay a visit to him more often, and his journey back to a normal and honest life would be easier. Instead, he... he doesn't seem to blame himself, and he barely stands with seeing me, while he doesn't want you to go to him."

"Rena understands, she's fearing your father will begin to hate you too, sooner or later, for getting engaged with one of the people of the group which has defeating him..."

"I think so, too... Finally he's to stay in prison for a great amount of time, so I am not afraid of a revenge by him... But... What should I do? I will have to take his place, apologizing for what he committed. And by doing that, I'm thinking to do something not completely right: his will would be not to search for forgiveness, his pride would never allow that, and by being the leader of my family, by claiming to wish for a remedy for his sins... I'm like saying we all are sorry for everything, me, my mother and my father, while that's not true. Am I recounting lies, in your opinion, Rena?"

The one on the wheelchair glanced at him, thoughtful. Therefore, she answered: "Daijiro, when someone falls and he's not able to stand up again alone, it's the others' duty to grab him and have it up, even if he doesn't ask for assistance. And after you do it, it's his turn to find the strength to command his legs and not to fall another time. This is the same case. You are helping him to have another possibility, by working all his issues out, and making peace with us, his past enemies. It's something he couldn't ever do, from where he's now. But the decisive step must be made by your father, not by you. If he doesn't want to be forgiven and welcomed, he will instantly show it with his attitude. And, even if the one he's having now is not the good one, he has still time to change it. For now, what you have done was of service to grant him this occasion, and to redeem yourself, and your mother, too. And by the way, how she is? I haven't seen her since the Watanagashi."

Those kind words relieved Daijiro. He was happy to have found her, her way of acting gave a certain self-confidence, to him. He smiled, and he tried to answer, but the girl asked to her boyfriend to stay silent for a second.

"Why?" he asked.

"Listen to them." She put a hand behind her ear "The cicadas. They are singing, it's the first time Rena can hear them, this year."

"You're right. This summer hasn't been hot at all, until now, and this sunny day has come after several rainy ones. They had never had the chance to emit their characteristic sound."

"Rena thinks so, too. In the previous period they were not given the discretion to sing, but now they can. Don't you think this is a metaphor of our situation, too, don't you think? They had suffered in the past days, and now they are shouting joyfully; at the same time, we had suffered in the last months, and now we're living happily."

"That's a charming image... But is it really so? I guess there's also another aspect."

"Daijiro-kun, what do you want to say?"

"It's quite simple... We can hear the noise produced by cicadas, but we can't understand which exact feeling they are spreading. If they even were dogs, or cats, we could get a hint of their emotions, even because we can look at how they move their tail and so on; but insects are diverse. I've never seen someone recognizing sentiments of bugs by only listening to their cry."

"Rena can get it... Rena was thinking they were happy cicadas because Rena is happy, and she's instilling her own feelings in the external world. Rena is happy, from your point of view, so the cicadas _must_ be happy... which is not always true. He he, Daijiro-kun is quickly learning from Rena, staying next to her must have this kind of consequences... But I'm not sure you've fully learned yet. Rena must confess she is not completely happy, in fact."

"Why? Are you ill?"

"No... You will know soon what I mean. Rather, why are you thinking that they are sad, Daijiro-kun? Is there any motive?"

The boy didn't rebut at once, he was staring at the falling Sun.

"Explicitly, there's none. I don't know about anything bad. But perhaps... Who knows..." he just said.

"You're right. Daijiro-kun. Rena has the same impression, but she also feels like we're to discover the truth in a very few days."

…

"Keiichi-san, will you ever be able to defeat me?"

The following morning, after the end of the lesson, Satoko was teasing his best enemy, as usual. That time was not like most of the other ones, they were the only fighting members of the club. Mion was absent from school, and when they asked Shion why she just waved her hand, as to say _I will tell you later: _hers didn't look a serious matter, however, their friend would have answered differently otherwise, so they had got concerned only in a limited measure. Shion had looked thoughtful, in fact, but it was not the first time they saw her so, they had imagined it was due to her frequent overapprehension. Anyways, even Rika and Rena, for their part, had never been aggressive companions, so the ones remained were those two, who were in the middle of that new chapter of their personal war.

"That will be funny. What do you have in store for me?"

"A far relished return." she put a hand in her pocket, and she grabbed a glove from it, wearing it with a quick move: "Can you recognize this?"

"No, I guess I've never seen it before."

"Well, it's true... It's the gauntlet I gave to Nii-Nii, to fight against his enemy. Lately I've refined it, and so I wanted to test it. So, will you be able to defeat this, or even only to survive for more time than what that bodyguard did?"

"A dangerous game... I love it... Let's try!"

Satoko clenched her fist, and she got ready for her first strike, excited and happy. She liked how Keiichi was always willing to rise to the occasion, they were in tune... She would have loved to keep him at her side, as friend and companion for a lot of time. But she had to center on that morning's challenge, now. That time she would have knocked that villain off his pedestal for good, and...

"WHHAAAAAAAAT?"

Their duel was forcedly suspended. Rika's sudden exclamation made them stop, making Satoko risk to fall down due to her outburst. Why had she screamed? The two ran from the courtyard to the classroom, following their friends.

It was a short trip, and they found themselves in the classroom in a pair of seconds. There, they found their little friend, who was staring frozen at Giancarlo. From him, she had just heard a piece of news she would have never expected, a piece of news she would have never liked to hear.

"It's so, Rika-chan. I'm sorry. Today has been my last day of school here. The day after tomorrow I will reach Haneda Airport, and from there my flight will leave to bring me back to Italy."

"But... But..."

"Rika-chan, I had told you that since the very beginning. You know I hadn't transferred here to stay forever. When we arrived here, our first schedule was to stay here one year, and then to come back to our Country. I am only doing what we've decided months ago, after all I can't remain away from my hometown, I have duties there and I can't fail to keep them..."

"But I thought the situation had changed..." Rika turned at Mion's empty desk "Now I see why she was absent, today. I can imagine what she's really doing at home, now..."

"I didn't want to involve her. It's already hard enough, in this manner. If you have more questions, ask me."

"You know it's going to be painful for her, then. Are you intending to leave her alone?"

"I have no choice, Rika-chan. We both have a role. Mion has to stay in Hinamizawa, and to be the Sonozakis' ruler. I have to go back to my village, and to continue what I've started years ago. I have to take care of the cotton mill, of my family, of my people... Try to comprehend me, please. You know, it has been Mom and Dad who had convinced me to live here two or three more months: they had insisted in order to make me stay at least until this Watanagashi, as what my sister desired, even if after what... what had occurred to Alice... Personally I wanted to bring her cinerary urn to our parents immediately, in March, and I still want to do that. I'm doing marvelously here, I will be carry this sweet memory into my heart forever, but I can't forget my duty towards her."

"Yes, I remember, when you had to call your father, and her boyfriend too, it hadn't been pleasant. But... the two months come after that had been awesome, for Mii-chan and you, you seemed so happy, you have gone out with your bikes, you have had some date, you have watched your photo albums. But... when had you decided to... to split up in this way?"

"Rika, we always knew that, we neither had to tell it in a loud voice. We had declared our feelings during the war against Megumi and Goemon – because it was a war, to all intents and purposes – but mostly because we wanted to give some faith and confidence to each other, and because denying it would have been even more absurd, by that moment. We judge ourselves as weak people who need to help one another, and... and I'm feeling as if... Mion is my kindred spirit..." He was getting embarrassed, he didn't like to talk about his personal emotions, but he was showing off in order to draw the attention, and to keep it far from Mion. He was offering himself as target, as scapegoat. It was a way to protect her.

"Anyways" he went on "we couldn't live together until the end, we had been conscious of that since the very beginning. That's why I wanted to go away from here at once, and not in June, I hoped this sorrow might be lesser in this manner. But my mother didn't like my idea, and together with her husband they had made me change opinion. Alice would have appreciated that, they had said..."

"I see. But there's a thing I don't understand. Why are you telling this only now? Your friends have been in the dark until now... it's quite like you, I must admit it, but it's not like Mii-chan, at all. Why have you chosen to behave so? Why such a short notice? In this way it seems nearly a sort of escape, as if you are speeding away from here, from your second home, from your mates, from your girlfriend..."

"Telling it brusquely, we don't want you to nose into this. We have well in mind what you would have done, if we had given you the discretion. You would have given us no rest, trying to convince me to stay, or to find a solution... We don't want this, we've already taken our last decision."

"And this is the reason why Shii-chan was so mute and depressed, in the last days... She surely was in the know of what machinations... You have begged her not to reveal anything, you must have debated a lot about that, and she must have consented to that, in the end, even if reluctantly. We should have got that clue."

"Indeed. But it's too late, now. Please..."

"Please my ass!" yelled Keiichi "And it won't matter if I have two hours or two years to mend your ways! Man, hadn't you told us your family is not like the Sonozakis, once? That you didn't need a strong and authoritarian leader, that you didn't want him? So, why don't you renounce totally to him? That would be simple."

"Keiichi..." Giancarlo whispered sadly. "Sorry, but I can't. Think about our peculiarities. Our family's cotton mill requires a well prepared person, and there is nobody among us who has studied in that field. That place was destined to be occupied by me, so my relatives directed themselves to diverse spheres. Preparing and instructing someone else would take too much time. I can't hang back."

"There's no need to do that. You can do this from here, too. You can stay in Hinamizawa, and sometimes travel to Italy with your wife to have a closer look at the situation down there, why not?"

"Why not, you're saying... You ought to figure it out right now. It's absurd to pretend to be capable to rule two families at the same time. We should fly from a village to another each time there is a serious matter. And what if there are two contemporary issues?"

"You could detach each other, temporarily."

"Kei-chan, you aren't surrendering... but it wouldn't work. What leader might ever keep his power, when he stays far from the ones he guides? Perhaps one basing his strength on fear and cruelty, but I don't want to be like one of that genre... And so, if for some reason there was a quarrel, it would be easy for one of the disputants to refute my authority. I don't want to lead someone in that way, staying so far would prevent me from understanding their real problems. Unless you want all my family to come and live here, which would be the most absurd brainwave I've ever heard."

"But they would help you, I'm certain! And then..." Keiichi lowered his look.

"You are thinking about phoning to my home in Italy, aren't you?"

The other boy raised his eyes again, as if he was confessing it.

"Quite predictable..." commented Giancarlo "I can see, you'd like to convince them, with your excellent oratory skill, to give them the strength to make it alone, and to give me the chance to be free and stay here... And probably they would even accept."

"Really? So why haven't yo-"

"Wait, I haven't finished yet. They wouldn't obey only because it's you who would speak to them. If you called, they would conclude this odd action can only reflect a deep desire coming from me, something I truly want. And so they wouldn't be so brazen to find the force to deny this wish. But it would be a giant sacrifice, for them. I know them, they would feel lost, they wouldn't be able to find out what to do, they would be uncertain about who would take my place, just like after my father's resignation... Because, in a corner of their mind, they would groan that I have thrown in the towel. And they would do that not because of spite, I am not meaning that, but because I've come after two chiefs who had quickly back out due to strain and anguish. I can't do that to them, I would pass on the message that I'm chickening out, that their wounds opened by my great-grandfather can't be healed, that nobody can take that place, that burden, and therefore I would cause a huge pain to all my family, in exchange for a personal interest. I would never be happy, with this unbearable load over my conscience. This is the truth, nobody has ever been a lion-hearted person, among the Sercos, we aren't warriors or hot-blooded people like the Sonozakis..."

"Neither Ali-chan?..."

"Neither Alice. She was extroverted, absolutely, but she has never had that kind of courage you were talking about, if you think well about it. We have always been moved by our sense of duty, which is a different thing and which is rightly evolved instead, but if you forget about that..."

"So... There's nothing we can do, for Mion and you?"

Giancarlo went to Keiichi, to Rika, and to the others who had joined them during the discussion: "No, not this time. The point is that we had already thought about every possible chance, before today, I had already reflected about the proposals you have just made, that's why I could rebut so easily and exhaustively... We had looked for any way out, but there's none of them... We're chained to our roles, which is what has allowed us to help the ones around us, but which is now dictating to us what we can do, and what we can't. This is just a consequence of the decisions we had responsibly taken in the past, and so we are finally accepting it. I would be terrifyingly sad, if I committed this action so similar to a sin, and the same goes for Mion... So, Please... don't make things harder than what they already are, for us."

"But are you going to pay us a visit, each year, or each time you can? Are you? Are you?" asked Rena, enormously sorry for what she was hearing.

"I don't know... I had talked about this with Mion, too. Not seeing each other would be cruel, but even coming here and leaving a few days, it would get sorrowful, too... So, the most reasonable answer I can give is _Likely it will be so, but not for now_. I want to let some time pass. It will help us to become more mature and to face this with more strength and serenity..."

Nobody dared to make further questions. It was plain that giving explanations was particularly painful, for him, and they wanted to spare him that, at least. So, he greeted them with a nod of the head, and he left the classroom.

Rena looked at Daijiro, and then at the window. From there, she could hear the sound of the cicadas. And as he had said the day before, their noise sounded diametrically opposite of what she had imagined previously.

They were seeming to cry desperately, plunged within an immensity of resignation.

…

"I can put myself in Shii-chan's shoes" commented Hanyuu "I don't want to sermonize about the fact she has told nothing. Rather, I'm angry with myself. How couldn't I see what was happening? Those ones have never been good liars, it was loud and clear that they were nursing some sad thoughts." then she turned at the others "Hadn't anybody had the suspicion this mess was about to take place?"

"No."

"No."

"I hadn't."

"I have to admit I had, instead..." Rena confessed, raising shily her arm "I remembered he couldn't stay here forever, and I had seen they were acting in an unusual manner. They weren't calm, by all means."

"So had you got the impression of what was badgering them?"

"Yes... But Rena has preferred to respect their silence, and not to trumpet what they wanted to keep secret. They had surely a reason, to do that."

"I really don't understand" protested Keiichi "Why suddenly you're all starting not to tell things to your friends anymore?"

"Because this has been their choice, and even if Rena disagrees with them, she will never give this sorrow to them! Think about that, Keiichi-kun... Any, any solution we'd eventually be able to find somehow would basically entail the separation of one of them from his respective family, from his own world. We already know that Mii-chan can't leave the Sonozaki clan, a great chaos and discord would be scattered among them, and another feud might begin, like the one we have warded off, and we can't say what would happen. Mion's presence is an indispensable requisite for the whole Hinamizawa's sake. As for Gi-chan, instead, we don't know how his family really works either, they have never described it. We can't propose a true remedy, because we can't see all the aspects of the problem. But we can say that there must be a very good reason, if he doesn't have the courage to leave his relatives to their own device. Likely there's still a lot to do, anywhere near to them, before the Sercos could find their peace."

"That's not nice at all, as description, but I fear it's totally correct... Shion, please could you tell us how is Mion?"

"How do you think she is? She's wasted. She haven't exited from the Manor for days, and she doesn't want to speak with anybody, neither with Mom or me... I can't really figure how I have to treat her, to make her more serene... But I guess time is the only healer, in cases like this..."

"I'm counting on that" answered Rika "but sometimes the situation gets worse, instead of getting better..."

"You're right. Frankly I'm not convinced by my own words..."

"Shion, what do you mean?"

The green-eyed girl didn't reply. She was keeping her look low.

"Shion?"

"You know, being informed in advance has its own advantages... I've been ruminating of this since I was told about their separation... After the dialogue with Satoshi-kun, after looking at them... We are talking about their happiness, in the end, and we must do everything we can to grant it. Everything, with no exceptions... I've waited for you to be informed in the manner they had planned before acting, I didn't want to defy them, but at the same time I want your support..."

"Could you explain to us what the heck have you in mind, finally?"

"It's easy to say that, Kei-chan. You can't do anything for them, _but I can._"

"What..."

"Follow me."

They all went to the Principal's room, and there Shion took the receiver of the telephone, without either asking for permission. The girl's vigorous and peremptory way of acting, however, made the man protest just for a moment, and after that they all listened to what she was saying. Evidently she had called the Manor, because she was organizing an official meeting with her sister and her mother.

After a short exchange of words, the girl roughly hang up, and with a convulsive gesture she invited them to go with her out of the building, where Kasai arrived with his car after a bunch of minutes.

"Shion, I don't understand..." said Keiichi, on the van.

"Shh. I have to concentrate. That won't be easy, and I'm scared to be going to be scared."

"But..."

"Shhh."

The atmosphere inside was getting heavy, and neither a fly would have been allowed to buzz, in that moment. Shion was drawing the glance by each of her companions, she was privy to that, but she wasn't feeling like calming, or giving any account. Her head was full of doubts, fears and dilemmas, about what she was going to do.

It was better to make all as quick as possible, and therefore, as soon as they arrived, Shion jumped out of the van without almost waiting for the means to completely stop, and she ran to the inner courtyard, chased by the others, until she reached the hall where Mion and her mother were awaiting them, and she slammed the sliding door. Her pony-tailed sibling, who was wearing a simple white kimono maybe taken in a hurry, was trying to keep a serious and dignified look, even if she was a bit disturbed and scared by that sudden convocation, and by that way of arriving. By now she was acquainted with how her sister was, it was clear she was excogitating something big.

And in fact Shion sat down, slightly panting, before she was asked by Akane the reason of that urgent meeting. She gazed at the two women in front of her, she sighed to take bravery, and she said calmly:

"It's simple. Sonozaki Mion, I'm begging you to give me back the place that you took some year ago. Namely, I'm ordering you to return to me the role of leader that you have stolen me."


	63. Dance with the Devil

**63 – Dance with the Devil**

_Hinamizawa, 22nd June 1984_

After speaking, Shion stayed silent, and Mion looked at her, in that gelid room. The few words just pronounced in that spare dojo were the breach of a promise that Oryou had asked to the nephew she considered the youngest, and this gesture of naughtiness, therefore, was not something which could be made carefreely. But Shion was ready to everything, now, they were talking about nothing less than Mion's sake and happiness.

"What's the meaning of this odd request?" the latter asked, mastering her astonishment.

"I would like to know that, too." added Akane "I hope this is a bad joke, I wouldn't like it. What's this story about the stolen role?"

"Easily said, Onee would be able to tell it as well. Mother, do you remember that afternoon when they had drawn that tattoo on her back? I wish you do, that had been a basic moment of all our lives. So... Hadn't you noticed anything wrong, in your daughters, in the days after?"

"No" the woman answered, not managing to dodge a moment of hesitation.

"Are you sure? Really?"

"What are you trying to make me say?" Akane exclaimed, frustrated "Of course I had seen Mion was uneasy, but it was not strange, getting that experience is so often a traumatizing event, most of all because you are not warned by your family, before the rite. But it has always been so, in the past centuries, there was nothing new. I hadn't felt far differently from her, when it had been my time."

"And then did even my sadness seem normal, to you?"

"You were worried about your sister's condition, it was natural..." but the two identical siblings' mother was beginning to speak more slowly. She was starting to grasp what Shion was going to declare.

"You see" she said, in fact "The point was that during our childhood, apparently, you cared only about the one labeled as Mion, not about the other child, so, in tat remote period, we were used to... to swap our hairstyle... It's something we have not done only in recent times, but also for many, many years..."

At that sentence, everybody had understood where she was driving at, but she anyways went on: "Mother, if Batcha had surrendered to the past traditions and killed the youngest of us, I would be still alive, and Onee wouldn't. By means of our actions we have proved to deserve this act of clemency, accepting our destiny till this moment, but in that time I couldn't permit you to always treat her in that insensible way, so I had granted her some day of happiness, switching our names and letting her be considered as Mion, and therefore as a valuable girl. And that day, we had made this operation again."

"So... Nee-Nee would be the real _Mion_, is it correct?" asked Satoko, dumbfounded, while Mion was speechless and she was neither attempting to deny that tale.

"Indeed. We couldn't go back to our original role anymore, due to the tattoo Batcha would have discovered it in a few time, so we couldn't do anything but accepting this. Without forgetting that not many days later I was sent away from the Manor, to our house in Okinomiya and subsequently to St. Mary's academy."

Everyone knew Shiod was an awful liar, so it was obvious she was sincere, and her mother was compelled to trust her. "Different hairstyles were not enough, then... If I had been more clever I would have kept your hair short, not to confuse you..." Akane confessed in fact, bitterly "But why are you pulling out this story, now?"

"Because things have changed here in Hinamizawa, and now I can tell the truth without being afraid of my safety. Moreover, we are not among a huge crowd, we are doing a familiar meeting. That's why I'm asking you this: _Step aside, Sonozaki Shion._"

"You know my name is Mion. I've not been called Shion for lots of years."

"Stop mocking us. You've not been called Shion since the last time you had loose hair, which has happened pretty recently. Everyone here knows that. But let's make a little game." she took the ribbon from her head "Why don't you help me to tie my hair in a ponytail, just like the one you're wearing right now? It would be amazing to see the others while deciding which is the real leader of the Sonozaki family. Distinguishing us would be a prominent endeavor."

The one the others knew as Mion swallowed.

"Let's cut it out. What's your final proposal, then?" asked Akane.

"I don't want to force you to have a girl named Sonozaki Shion as ruler, that would cause a huge mess among our relatives. I only want to take my seat back. Since today, if you don't mind, I will be called Sonozaki Mion, and I will do everything she has done until now, and everything she's supposed to do in the future. I am going to take care of Hinamizawa in place of you, helped by Kei-chan's strength just in case. I am going to be obedient, I won't have odd ideas, don't worry. No one will ever figure this out, I will never make our relatives watch my back, in a way, and I don't believe they will even try, they have no motive to do that. In this manner, you will be freed from your duties, and you will be allowed to go anywhere you want and to do anything you want."

It was now plain what Shion was aiming at. There was no way Giancarlo could stay far from his hometown, but the opposite was not necessarily true. Once she had been relieved of all her formal roles, Mion could smoothly leave Hinamizawa, and join her beloved. They would have lived together in the village of Serco, and from time to time they would have come back to Japan, during holidays for example. The Syndrome was not a menace for her, it had never been one, hence she could definitely do that. Unless her pride permitted her to make that step.

"You're suggesting me to tell another lie, then..." Mion said "You're asking me to take your place, and to be what I am not... I would disavow who I've been in these last years, in other worlds. Haven't the fables of the past sufficed for you? They have only brought thousands of misunderstandings, and no help at all."

"Mion" answered Keiichi "We-"

"Not this time, Kei-chan" Shion interrupted him, raising her right hand to his face "I can figure out you'd like to help me, but this is my battle. And as to you, Onee, there's something you are overlooking. You're about to tell a lie, regardless of the choice you're going to take now. If you accept my idea, you will be destined to pass you off as Sonozaki Shion, deceiving everybody but us. If you refuse, you will be destined to pass you off as Sonozaki Mion, which we know is not the real truth, and you would still deceive everybody but us. So, from the point of view of the village there would finally be no difference between one decision and the other, and then why should you renounce to your happiness?"

"There would be some difference, and how! You know nothing about leading a clan, and a village like this. After they had decided I was to be the ruler, they taught me all they could about how to behave in the various circumstances. Being prudent and reasoning about the world around you doesn't belong to your character, you're too impulsive, and instead the first thing Batcha told me was not to take reckless decisions. I can't leave such a responsibility to you, I would never be quiet, thinking you among all those nags."

"You have learned all of this, what is making you presume I can't? I have time to assimilate all the basics, we are not in an emergency situation anymore, and the others will be happy to assist me. Batcha wanted Kei-chan to be the guide in quality of heiress' husband" she glanced grinning at Keiichi, who blushed a bit awkward "But he can do that even as mere friend, or collaborator. After all, history is full of important and reliable counselors. Moreover, I've already replaced you dozens of times, during the city councils, or while you were not in condition to attend the official meetings. I am not completely in the dark of this art. And I can't neglect the fact what you've been taught until now wouldn't be wasted, Gi-chan would greatly appreciate a good helper, while dealing with the affairs of his own family."

"And so would you like to leave Hinamizawa so, all of a sudden? I... No, "Shion" would be seen like someone who ran away because of a serious motive. The others villagers would be disappointed, if not worried about her abrupt disappearance, they would gossip about a nasty friction between you and me, and as new leader you would be put in a non-pleasant situation. You know how people love to chat about things they are not informed about."

"I have never said you have to go at once! Let your sweetheart leave this Sunday alone, as scheduled, and then follow him two months later, or three. You will have time to say good-bye to your fellow citizens with calm, in this manner, claiming you must go somewhere far. Just keep calm and serene, and they will never get suspicious: you can also decide whether saying them you're going to Italy with that boy or telling you're pointing at elsewhere, it's up to you. Even, you may also keep Gi-chan without a clue until you reach his house in Italy, if you prefer. I can already imagine the scene, it would be a giant shock for him, you might make him die of a broken heart..."

"Very funny. But let me understand – If everything went as you are planning, the girl they think is Sonozaki Mion would get engaged with Satoshi-kun, am I right?"

"You are."

"And doesn't it get into your head that this ending is about to be odd? They all are aware it is Shion who is in love with Satoshi-kun, and by seeing one sister shooed and the other with her sibling's boyfriend... They would believe Mion has stolen Shion's husband-to-be, if we're lucky."

"And if we're unlucky?"

"They will find out the truth, that is Shion has taken Mion's role, on the sly."

"Hmmm... I don't think so, unless you stay here for a month or two and you look like a quiet "Shion" and totally at ease, as I've just suggested. Certainly I can't fully exclude there will be some backbiting by some of the blabbermouths, but if we base our behavior on what the others say, we would be doomed. Moreover, consider that at the moment Sonozaki Mion is not engaged with anybody, officially: together with Gi-chan you have only spent some romantic afternoon, you had made no announcements to the community because you know you had to split up, indeed, so the chief of our family can choose any partner she wants. And don't deny you liked Satoshi-kun a few, in the past..." Shion's face got telling.

Still, Mion feigned to ignore it: "But I'm not guessing your boyfriend is ready. You're wanting Satoshi-kun to do something which is not up to his potential."

"And instead I'm precisely guessing that. Just yesterday he had told me he wants to try to make himself be hired from Okinomiya's Child Consultation Center, because he desires to take care of someone, he'd feel fully realized if he succeeded in doing that. So, why don't we can't ask him to take care of the whole village? Of course he must learn a lot of things, just like me, but I don't think he would be a bad landmark, not nearly. And finally this would be the best way to end the chapter about that damn Dam War, once and for all. The heirs of the two opposing families getting married... We wouldn't be forced to square with our past, anymore."

"Yet, you're fundamentally excluding me from our group, from our club. I had created it, and now I'm cut out from it... You know our group has always been the source of our strength, our second home."

"Onee, I'd say we're looking at it from two separate points of view. Our group ought to be a way to reach our purposes, not a purpose itself. Years ago you had set it up to help Satoko, to keep her far from her uncles and to grant her some moment of composure, and the same goes for each of us, both yesterday and today. But if on the contrary it becomes an obstacle, if it impedes us from reaching happiness... We must find the courage to part with it. It's painful, but it's a necessary step. Like young birds leaving their nest, or young men leaving their parents' house, that's just the same."

"I would have never believed you could do so nice speeches, Shion."

"I had been thinking about them for days... And furthermore, I must prove you to deserve the role I'm aiming at. That's why I composed them alone, without asking help from Kei-chan, or Rena, or someone else."

Mion stared at her, upset, before whispering: "Anyways, I can't leave Japan without an adult, I'm not 20 yet."

"Well, well, you're running out of arguments... Haven't you forgotten you would be about to be called Shion? Kasai has always been with her in the last period, and he's going to do the same also in the future. He will found something to do, down there, being your personal bodyguard, having some exchange opinions with the local hunters, or what else..."

"Stop with this foolishness, Shion. You already know I will never accept, no matter how much you go on speaking."

The two twins eyed each other, wordless.

"Your stupid pride, hm?" Shion commented, after some second.

"Yes, the pride you've called _stupid_... It had been the one which had sustained me, since the day they put that tattoo on top of me. Stick this in your mind, I will never draw back from my duty due to a personal interest... It would be unacceptable."

"Onee, why are you so stubborn? I-"

"That's enough, Shii-chan. Mion, might I talk with you a minute?"

Calm words that nobody was expecting. Shion got startled, and she turned around.

"Gi-chan, why are you here? Who told you where we were?"

"Somebody gave me a ring, saying that if I hadn't come I would have regretted that."

"He he..." Satoko tittered, wrinkling her own nose with a finger.

"When did you..." exclaimed Rika "Oh, well, trying to understand is useless, we're talking about the famed Trapmaster. Nippa~!"

"I'm glad you joined us." said then Shion "But as I've said to Kei-chan, too, I must ask you not to..."

"Shion, if you want to be a wise person you must also learn to realize when you have to back out" Akane explained "This matter involves mainly them, so it's the best choice to let them decide about that."

"But I'd like to..."

"Please, don't insist. They are grown up, they can discuss about it without us."

"Thank you, Akane-san." the boy thanked her, before continuing later: "Mion, I have been behind the sliding door for a while, and I've heard everything. I had also time to reflect about that. And I came to a conclusion."

"Which is?"

He sighed, deeply, and he said: "Sonozaki Mion, if your sister offers herself to take your place, everything is totally unalike. Earlier I feared there was no solution, but now I'm relieved, thanks to the fact I was wrong. So, I'd like to ask you to go back with me, but I already know you'd reply that it would be rude of me, because I'd use your own sibling for my purpose. I'd retort that this is a wish coming from her own lips, that all this group seems to agree with her, looking at their faces, and I'd continue by explaining that I'd make her feel bad, if I didn't take advantage of this and if I didn't make this proposal. I'd retort I'd make her feel bad, and all our friends too, and I would add that in this way you could still go to University, in Italy you start attending it when you're eighteen or nineteen. I know you are sorry for not being allowed to complete your education here in Japan, due to the circumstances..."

"I don't know a word of your language, how could I be able to go to your schools?"

"You'd have a full year to learn it, and I'd help you to do everything. And I don't believe you wouldn't be able to make it... However, I fear that all these good points wouldn't be enough to convince you. That's why I have to do something which frankly I'm not that good at doing. Yes, I prefer not to speak at all, and rather to challenge you, Sonozaki Mion."

Mion opened her eyes wide, surprised "To challenge me?"

"Yes. Your group – even, _our_ group – has always been established on challenges, and various club activities, and so I'm using the same technique also for this important issue. And this time there will be a prize, which is you. If I win, you will be obliged to follow me. If you win, you will be free to live where you want, and I won't make any further pressure."

"And what if I don't accept your glove of defiance?"

"The leader of our club who refuses a challenge? Impossible, your pride wouldn't permit you to do this. Anyways, you shouldn't be afraid of being forced to a decision you dislike. If you're really so resolute to stay in Hinamizawa, you will do your best and you will defeat me with no particular efforts. I've never been a genius at playing games, you know that."

Mion was visibly tempted, she didn't dare to answer. It was Akane who spoke, instead: "So? What are you proposing? A duel with sword? Or a game like the ones you had been making at school?"

"I was thinking about..."

"Before answering, reflect carefully, young man." the woman went on "Keep this in mind: if you chose a challenge involving mostly your physical strength, Mion would be likely the winner, there's no doubt about it; if you chose instead one requiring primarily your mental abilities, you'd turn out to be the winning one, but it would be unfair of you, because you are the challenging one, and the bet at stake is not precisely a joke."

"You have a strange manner to have it out, but I must admit this close examination is not airy-fairy..."

"I was imagining that. So, there's only a way to arrange a loyal duel. You know, they say that people can divided in three parts: body, mind and soul. So, since Mion is better than you about the physical sphere and you are more skilled than her about the mental one, to break this tie we must compare your souls..."

"Is it really possible, is it?" asked Rena.

"Yes, it is. We must check how strong is your will about this fundamental decision, and I know a method to check it. Do you remember the drug Megumi had used in Ibaraki?"

"That one, again..." mumbled Keiichi "Yes, I can figure what are you trying to do. You want to use it again."

"Kasai" Akane quickly said "You know where it has been placed, don't you? Might you take some of it and bring it here, please?"

The bodyguard obeyed, standing up and leaving the room, while the woman continued "He will be back in thirty seconds, more or less. Anyways, once fire has been set on the substance, it will take some time for the gas to take effect and to let them give a shape to their own feeling by way of those hallucinations, so why don't we go on talking? We could hear some interesting spark."

Mion looked at Kasai who was putting down some candles, to make the powder burn and to give off the mind-expanding gas, and she said: "I don't want a long fight, it would be senseless. Just a ghost each, and just a blow each. The one who wins the first clash will overcome the other. Have you anything against this?"

"No, that's fine for me." Giancarlo answered.

Some minute went by, dominated by a total silence, while Akane, Kasai and the rest of the club was staying on the shelf. Rika was remembering the old world where Keiichi had aided Rena by fighting against her on the roof of their school... That was an entertaining game as well, in their opinion, a game where there had been no punishment, but where something very important had been decided. And now Giancarlo and Mion were doing a similar duel. _We always use this method, in the end. This mindset must be due to all the activities we have done in our club, we can't do anything diverse from this, _she concluded melancholically. Still, in a small way she was shaken, she could see how her friends were anxious. They were sat on their legs, but their muscles were stretched, tears of sweat were falling from their cheeks, and they were hardly breathing. They were in line for the beginning of the battle. But abruptly Mion exclaimed: "That's amusing... In all these years I had fun while giving penalties to who was used to be the losing one in our activities, I can't say how many times I've forced Kei-chan to wear that ridiculous dress... And now I'm doing the same, another time, but there is something different... If I lose, my punishment will be coming with you, Gian."

"I know in our club we reason only considering penalties and punishment, but I don't like to hear you saying that would be such a hard condemn, Mion. I can't really accept this way to tell things, I would have never done this if I had though it."

"But wouldn't it be a condemn, perhaps? There is no prize for me, with this game. There is only a plausible punishment. For you it's slightly diverse, because there is a possible reward, but there is a far bitter penalty, too... Life is full of punishments, more than of awards, this is the way it works."

"Is this what you really think or rather what you make us believe? In the end, your life is the reward, and if you win we're letting you use it as you like. Neither Shii-chan nor I are going to pester you, in this case. If you hadn't accepted my challenge, instead, your sister would have gone on firing you with questions and remarks. There is indisputably a good prize even for you, you can see it."

"There were many other ways to get it. It was enough to move Shion away, elsewhere from the Manor. Driving her away from Hinamizawa..."

"As if you could ever do that."

"They almost sound to quarrel, now." commented Satoshi.

"It's just because they are nervous..." rebutted Shion "I know Onee very well, and it's not difficult to understand. They are conscious to be gambling a lot, in this moment, and..."

She didn't end the phrase. She was staying agape. The walls of the room they were in had disappeared, as if they were made of ash and powder, and the people inside them were now in the open air. Instead of the rough wooden floor there was an infinite expanse of grass, moved by a soft warm wind, and a stunning sky overflowing with stars and a giant white Moon was watching over their incredulous heads. Black mountains had appeared in the distance, as if they were in a large, noiseless valley, but not like the one where Hinamizawa was.

The gas was taking effect.

Rika stared at the two contenders. Who had been the creator of that fictional world? It was marvelous and frightening at the same time, because they couldn't foresee what was to happen next. And so, the blue-haired girl noticed a thing. Mion was presumably the author of it, because Giancarlo was observing towards a well-defined direction, which was the full Moon.

There, there was a girl sat on the inferior border of the satellite, with milling legs as on a celestial seesaw. Apparently as aged as her creator, although her face was cut through by a multitude of folds and scars. Her long black hair showed a pair of bumps nearby her temples, and every inch of them seemed a couple of horns. A gray unadorned kimono and two inquiring red eyes completed the picture.

"Do you like her?" asked Mion to her opponent, grinning towards her creature "I hope so, I put all myself in that image, and she symbolizes a lot for me. Anyways, where's your spirit, instead? I can see it nowhere. Have you hidden it, maybe?"

"No, it's right in front of you."

Mion looked before her. Next to Giancarlo, there was a little girl, about invisible in that bright night. Younger than Rika, or Hanyuu, or Satoko, she was wearing a very simple black gown. Her transparent eyes were barely visible, concealed behind a curtain of loose silver hair, which was falling not only behind her nape but also ahead of her face.

"She looks alike she's just come out of a hospital, or a mental asylum... Do you want to win with _her_?" commented Mion.

"Appearances can be deceptive." he answered.

"Absolutely. But also the ones of my ghost can be that. But you will discover it quite soon."

"Hey, Rika" Hanyuu asked softly to her descendant "What do those phantoms stand for, in your opinion? They have created them starting from their emotions and fears, right? So they must be the icon of something they feel."

"Well, about Mii-chan I have a hypothesis. If you observe carefully the girl she has evoked, you can deduce she partially resembles the demon painted on her back. We can define her as a demon herself, definitely, her horns are pretty illuminating."

"I hadn't noticed that. And so..."

"...She looks the symbol of her role, to me. That drawing must have inspired her, and she has summoned that spirit taking her tattoo as starting point. That devilish girl... she's the amalgam of all she is for Hinamizawa and the Sonozaki clan. She is what links her with this land, what is keeping her here."

Hanyuu caressed nervously her horns. "I see. And what about Gi-chan's one?"

"In this case I have to give up, I haven't got the faintest idea. That little phantasm seems a Japanese-looking one, so she can't be a little Ali-chan. And moreover her eyes seem "normal", they aren't like a broken mirror, like the ones I had seen on his face that day in the cave, when he had got crazy. It would have really been like him, and I was expecting them, instead..."

"As if he has summoned something which doesn't belong to him, is this what you're saying?"

"I'm saying nothing, Hanyuu. But we can ask him later, if you're curious."

The purple-haired girl nodded, and then she went back looking at the scene. Mion's demon had stood up, gazing at the ones below with a disdainful look, and long bowed claws had appeared on her bony hands.

"I don't need any weapon" murmured the pony-tailed girl "I don't need a sword, or a gun, like what the others have done in Okinomiya. What I've experienced in all these years, before the tattoo, and after too... It's something which can hurt, which can almost kill. And I've transferred all of that into the heart of my ghost... That's why she's so strong. She's carrying a strong spirit, something I have confidence in... And so..."

The demon abandoned the Moon which had generated her, and she jumped, flying with unseen wings against the little girl, with bloodstained eyes. Her opponent was immobile, just gazing at her with a serious look, and she was doing nothing.

The demon was approaching her enemy, with unsheathed claws, and everyone realized that single blow was about to be decisive.

The two came into contact, and a flash wrapped up everything.

And when it had gone, the starry sky had disappeared, and they all had come back to the room of the Manor where they had begun the meeting. The duel had finished, and the presence of only one spirit was sanctioning the name of the winner.

"What... has happened?" asked Keiichi.

"It's simple" explained Giancarlo "When our phantasms touched each other, Mion's one has been like pulverized. She didn't handle the collision."

"How... How..." exclaimed Mion, under shock.

"Mion, this was mainly a battle between wills, wasn't it? So, weapons were totally useless. I only gave one thing, to this little girl: a strong, strong will. Even stronger than mine. In her mind, she has done nothing but going on saying _I want to win, I want to win, I want to win..._ And her soul has been so strong to write the destiny of this battle itself, without any further action or external help. That's all."

"So your will was stronger than hers, isn't it true, isn't it?"

"No, Rena-chan, that's not exact. The one of the ghost on my side was stronger than the one of the ghost on her side."

"And isn't it the same thing?" asked Satoko, puzzled.

Giancarlo shook his head, like saying that wasn't true, and he stood up, walking towards Mion. The girl had begun to weep, and she stammered: "Well, you won... And your prize will be a girlfriend with neither pride nor will... What will be left to me? You have proven I am nothing but a weak person, unable to do anything... I'm always at the mercy of who wants me to do something, even if I don't want to do it..."

"Mion, please don't cry."

"I can't stop, sorry. Without my companions' support, I can't ever win a 1vs1 duel, neither if I do my best..."

"This is not true. Listen to me, I won only thanks to a reason, and this reason is I've cheated. This was not a 1vs1 duel, it had never been one since the beginning..."

"I... don't understand..." said Mion, bewildered, while her tears had been drying by his handkerchief "Are you saying that Ali-chan's soul was with you and that she has assisted you..."

"No, I am not meaning that. Somebody helped me, but it was not Nee-chan. Look closer at my ghost, and you might see the truth."

"Your ghost... Sure, unless someone opens the door to make some fresh air open, the hallucinations won't go away..." The green-eyed girl watched the phantom. Behind that fall of hair, she was sweetly smiling, and she was keeping a closed fist on her stomach, as if she was holding a little object. Mion realized that, and she eyed that tiny hand, until it was opened.

There was a sky blue ribbon, in it.

"I can't see anything from here!" Shion complained "What the heck is taking place, over there?"

Her sister didn't answered, and she delicately took the ribbon with two fingers. "I... I can recognize this... I haven't forgotten it." With a gesture of her hand, Mion asked to the spirit to move around, in way of turning her back to her. Then, the pony-tailed girl started to touch the girl's hair, moving it far from her face, and tying it with the ribbon. An operation which took a few seconds, but whose result was impressive.

"Oh, my goodness!" exclaimed Keiichi, once she had finished. "That's Shion's exact copy! The color of her eyes and hair are different, but apart from that she's her spitting image, at least in miniature! I bet a coffee she was like her, when she was young!"

"Kei-chan, can't you recall a word of what I had said some minute ago?" the other scolded him "Before the day they had drawn the tattoo, I was called Mion, and I was used to wear a ponytail. Then, that spirit is not my painting when I was young, but it's Onee's one."

"So, has Mii-chan been defeated by... herself? Has she?"

"I guess I owe you some explanation." Giancarlo said "Mion, I am certain that, within yourself, a part of you wanted to stay and another wanted to leave with me. I know that because it had been the same for me, before, something inside me was keeping on saying that I was only a selfish individual, by forcing you to come with me, but I had deeply reflected about this behind the door, in order to take a choice and be sure that challenging you was the right decision. We could say that one part of me had convinced the other. And so, when your mother had explained what kind of duel we were going to undertake, I began to mumble, and I had an eureka moment. Akane-san's speech reminded me that gas could also awake the most hidden emotions and feelings, so I allowed one part of you to help me to give strength to this spirit. That's why she's carrying this look, there is something belonging to Mion, in this spirit. Eyes and hair were not the same not to make you get it too early, before the end of the duel, but this is the truth."

"And so, in simple terms?" asked Daijiro.

"That one was not a battle between Mion's will and mine, but a battle between a half of her will and the union of the other half with mine, combined together. A 2vs1 duel, to put it simply, one whose end couldn't clearly be diverse from this, since Mion was fighting against herself plus an external help. But this has anyway demonstrated which is the strongest wish, in her heart."

"So, I have unconsciously created this girl, too... And so I haven't lost..."

"You haven't _only _lost. You have both lost and won."

"But so? What am I supposed to do? Staying or going away..." she looked at the boy "Unless, the words you had used to define our duel... Sure... Now I'm understanding everything..."

"What are you saying?" exclaimed Hanyuu, who was losing the thread of the conversation.

"_If I win, you will be obliged to follow me. If you win, you will be free to live where you want, and I won't make any further pressure._" Rena repeated "It's all plain, then. If Mii-chan thinks to have lost, she has inevitably to go. If she thinks to have win, she can live everywhere she likes... Which means that if she desires so she can decide to go with him, even in this case."

"And I've just proved that inside you there is also a strong will who wants to live with me." Giancarlo finished the sentence. "So, what's your last decision. There is finally nobody who really wants you to be unhappy, here. Neither you want."

"I... I am still doubtful... How can I be sure this girl is really a part of me? It could be just the symbol of your will, stronger than mine..." It was Mion's last defense line, which fell rapidly.

"Mion, I can give you the evidence of this, too." her boyfriend replied, in fact "In these last months, you showed me dozens of photos. But since you still had to keep the secret about your childhood, you showed me only photos about the daughter who was called _Mion, _who was Shii-chan in reality. Therefore, photos about a girl with a ponytail, and not about her sister. So, how could I predict the right color of the ribbon? If I had been the one imagining it, it would have been yellow like the one Shii-chan is wearing now. You hadn't become aware of that, but it was you who added this detail."

"It was me... But what if you have seen a photo of me with that ribbon? How can you prove this?"

"I can't, indeed. About this, you must trust me. Trust all of us, please. And trust what you're feeling in your heart. I know it would be a hard decision, normally, you'd be torn about the part of you who wants to leave and the part of you who wants to stay, which exists as well. That is the motive which has pushed your friends and I to make this suggestion, and to beg you to give heed to us. Please accept it, and you won't regret it, I can assure that."

Mion looked around herself. Everyone was glancing at her, comforting her and giving courage to her with a sweet, marvelous smile, including the spirit which was still there. And so, hearing all that heat warming her heart and her soul, Mion finally convinced herself, and she smiled in turn.

"Yes, I'm trusting you." she concluded, freeing herself from the heaviest of all the burdens.

* * *

**Author's note: Just the epilogue, and then we will be done :)**

**About the end of this long story, until the very end I didn't know if making Gian leave alone or making his love dream real... The truth is that both of them are becoming "banal", from a certain point of view, since by now there are plenty of books/anime/manga ending in both the ways. I hope you liked my final choice (there had been to sad story in my novel...)  
**


	64. Have a nice life, see you in Heaven

**Epilogue – Have a nice life, see you in Heaven**

_This world, now and forever._

"I really must tell you a thing... Who were you trying to kid before, in all fairness? Admit it, you were in league with Mom, at the dojo."

Giancarlo turned at his brand new girlfriend, surprised by that sentence. They were both looking out the window, contemplating the placid white Moon in front of them. They were alone, finally managing to get a moment of relax, and they were feeling free to say what they were thinking. Unluckily, the girl's ones didn't look soft and sweet as he maybe desired.

"Why are you believing that, Mion?"

"Because if I inspect it again, I can see that it has been too perfect, seen from your slant. The fact you had contrived that plan, summoning that ethereal spirit to make that sermon which sounded prefabricated... You had prepared everything, you already knew what Mom and Shion were going to do. You were aware that my sister would have come here, and that my mother would have proposed that kind of challenge."

"Can you trust me, if I tell you I wasn't? Akane-san had wrong-footed me, so I had to find a good solution in a few seconds... I had to give heed to my instinct, which is unusual, to me. I always like to have some time to reflect carefully, but today I couldn't, and so I had to do what I usually don't, and to trust my instinct. But I guess that's normal, people grow and become wiser, definitely. You know, when I had initially chosen to challenge you, hidden behind the door, I was thinking about arm wrestling..."

"You would have lost, you bookworm."

"Unless you decided to lose intentionally. You know, the part of my speech about the effort you were to put in our duel would have been valid even in that case."

"There was no chance this old lady could lose on purpose."

"We'll never know that. However, there is another matter we should discuss."

"Which is?"

"How should I call you, starting from tonight? Mion or Shion?"

"What a stupid question! Call me..."

The green-haired girl blocked herself. It was not a stupid question, as a matter of fact. As far as they were still in Hinamizawa, she had to be labeled as _Shion_, since the swap with her sibling was about to take place that same night. But what about the days after leaving? Theoretically she could choose any name she desired, nobody had ever met her far from the village. She might choose to go on being called _Mion, _even if there was another one in Hinamizawa, and the others would have never discovered that. After all, she was still loving her old name, it was the symbol of what she had been in the last ten of years. That was the proof her life hadn't been useless, after being isolated and neglected by most of her family during her childhood. And now, she might have been compelled to renounce it...

She got uncertain, and Giancarlo noticed it. So, he mumbled for a second or two, and then he sentenced: "I am going to call you Neko-chan."

She stared at him, skeptical. "Huh? _Neko_? A cat, you mean? What genre of demented idea is this?"

"Just a little wordplay. You probably aren't conscious of that, but the spelling of the appellation _Mii-chan _ sounds almost identical to the Italian term _micia, _which indeed means _female cat. _I don't think someone else will get the connection between the two words, but at least this will be a testimony of your past. We can use it even here in Hinamizawa, if that's the case, the most important thing is to distinguish you from your sister, but the way you do it with shouldn't matter, should it? Furthermore, I'd guess it fits you quite well, don't you remember the cosplay dress you had to wear some week ago, in sign of penalty? With that long tail and that couple of faux ears you seemed a true catwoman..."

"What a dumb ruse..." but she liked it, and therefore she concluded she hadn't anything against it. Rather, she remembered a thing, and she took an object from her pocket.

"This belongs to you, man" she said, handing Giancarlo's watch towards its owner "I've always forgotten to give it back to you, in these months."

The boy gave a glance to it, and then he answered: "You can take it, if you want. Consider it like a present by me."

"I was imagining it was worthy a lot, to you."

"It is. But I want you to have it. In all these years it helped me to muster courage, but now this role has been accomplished. I desire you to feel like being part of my family, that's the reason of my decision."

"Well... if you insist... You little arrogant, you're saying I'm weak and I need this watch."

He blushed "No, I didn't mean to..."

"Yeah, yeah" she replied, having fun while teasing him. "Anyways, I don't want to attend other annoying surprises, now. We had enough troubles, in this months, and the best manner to avoid them is not to leave anything to fate. We must organize everything, our whole future life will be perfectly scheduled, and from tonight on I pretend not to run into unpredictable events anymore..."

…

They went on discussing about that for a while, but they didn't know that arranging their incoming lives would have soon turned out to be useless. They still weren't sure about the proper name to use for her, Mii-chan, Shii-chan or Neko-chan, but the fact was that, during that same cold night, an unpredictable event did occur.

The fact was that, during that same cold night, that so weird girl got pregnant.

…

Some summer later, the sixteen-years-old Rika Furude was going to the Shrine, followed by Hanyuu. Her ancestor was accompanying her while flying, in fact she had had to go back to her spiritual form, since otherwise she would have always kept the semblance of a little girl – her incarnation spell had been defective, exactly like the one she had cast in the other circumstance, during the war against Takano. If she had stayed in the village with the image of an ordinary girl, as years were going by she would have never grown up, physically, and obviously that would have seemed suspicious to the other inhabitants, so she had to find an excuse to vanish another time.

For once, they were not in a hurry, they were waiting for a friend to come to the Shrine as well, and in the meanwhile they could think back about what had happened in the last period.

"I'm tired" exclaimed Rika "Why have Satoko and Keiichi-kun trotted me out? They'd better leave me alone, I must set the preparations for the Watanagashi!"

"And why should they? There was nothing so uncommon in this kind of procedure, seen from their point of view."

"Of course, but they could spare me that poor figure! I had to be the one announcing their official engagement!"

Hanyuu couldn't do without laughing, which she tried to hide with her wrist, while Rika couldn't avoid keeping on complaining.

"I knew they have always been happy to spend some time together, that they have always been amusing themselves, while playing with those endless loop of traps and tricks, but... Dammit, there are... six-seven years of difference between their ages! Couldn't she choose a younger catch?"

"There are couples who work pretty well and have even a larger difference, you know. Don't forget, for example,, that Kimiyoshi's wife is fifteen years younger than his husband... And maybe Satoko is the right woman for Keiichi-san, they both look at their lives like at a great adventure to manage in company with their friends..."

"If you're saying that... Hanyuu, can you imagine what sort of sons can those two pests have? Get ready to what is the most similar thing to a living inferno..."

"Well, if they get from their mother, Keiichi-san's future kids won't be an easy matter, for him... Little and tiny girls learn very rapidly how to entertain themselves. Poor Keiichi-san, I'm not envying him."

"Tsk, they just talk too much about that, and you too. Sometimes I'd like my ears to become deaf... Don't you know any curse or spell which might be just right for me?"

"Don't you think to be exaggerating? I know nothing like that. Rather, you could also spare yourself the effort to make that bad exclamation, when they had told you their decision."

"Which one... Ah, sure, you're meaning the one when I had told them _You two, all your live together? What the fu..._"

"And she's saying it again! If the ones here could hear you they would be puzzled and they would feel even sorry, while listening to these ignominious words coming from their priestess! Fortunately that other time we were alone at her house, but Satoko was not expecting such a villain comment!"

"Okay, nevermind, let's say I didn't tell that..." Rika raised her head, annoyed, reflecting about the attention received from Keiichi and coming from the girls of the group. They all were sure he would have chosen one between Rena and Mion, in 1983... But finally Keiichi had favored the one she could imagine the least, in the beginning, but once he was so happy she didn't mind. And to some extent, that one had been the only unforeseen event of all those years. As new leader of her clan, Shion had proved at once to be really Oryou's grandchild, she had been even too stubborn and impulsive, in more than one situation, and without Satoshi's intervention she would have caused another feud with the older members of her family... But everything had run fine, in the end, nobody was suspecting about where the real _Mion _was, and Akane had never regretted to have let her other daughter leave.

Rika suddenly realized to be the only single member of the old club. All of her friends had found a partner, a husband, or a wife... Of course, her role was making her able to find easily someone who could get interested in her. She was a well-known priestess, the chief of the respected Furude lineage... No way she could stay a spinster for all the rest of her life, if only she wanted she could find a decent husband in a flash. But although she could figure it out, that actual state of things was anyway making her a bit uneasy. Maybe that was due to her nature, to her attitude... Still, that was not such a problem, at least for now.

Finally, they were reached by a known voice.

"Senpai, senpai! Here I am... I hope not to be too late."

"No, Kiriko-chan, you aren't."

A girl with long black hair joined the girl and the spirit, and she was not a total foreigner. It was Kiriko, the girl who had been shot by Keiichi in her eye, many years before. After the facts of 1984, they had invited her to spend her summers in Hinamizawa, alone or with her parents and fully at the Sonozakis' expense, formally to give a close look to Keiichi's father's new masterpieces – they were amazing, as she was going on claiming, even if she sounded embarrassed each time she had to tell her opinion. And she had gladly accepted. Of course, she didn't wear the special colorful glasses she had when she was a little girl, anymore, so she had grown hair, in order to hide with it her damaged eye. The medics, and Irie too, had clearly told them surgery was not possible in her case, it would have been too risky, and so she was condemned to stay so for all her life. But she didn't look alike minding about that, and she had entrusted more than once to them that her summers in that far little village were the happiest periods of her year. And so, since Satoko was not willing at the moment, Kiriko was the one appointed for assisting Rika with the choice of the suitable hangings for the next Watanagashi, and the town girl showed to get greatly cheerful for that opportunity.

Ensued by the invisible Hanyuu, the two came to the Shrine, and they passed some minute looking for festoons and other ornaments. But the blue-haired girl could see her friend was absent-minded. With her free eye, she was continuing to admire the panorama overlooked by that old temple, just behind her. Rika asked her what she was doing, and Kiriko answered:

"I am sorry, senpai... But I was thinking... that this is a real heaven. Now I understand why Keiichi-san has decided to live here forever."

"No, it isn't." rebutted Rika, with few blunt words. "Don't make yourself be deceived by the appearance, Hinamizawa will never be what you're saying. This heap of houses and fields can be a wonderful place where to live, but a real paradise is surely much better than it. Up there you would never have to worry about your concerns, as we have to do down here."

"Perhaps you're right, senpai. But this is still an awesome place where to rest. School is always so hard, during the whole year, and being allowed to distract myself in this country village is marvelous..."

Rika smiled, and then she quietly recited:

_The ant which picked the crop in the restless summer  
now can sleep happily and have the deserved prize,  
since the noisy and insolent cicada is dying, far from his den._

_The brown bear is quiet, in the middle of its eternal sleep,  
because its needy stomach is now full and pacific  
and cold and mankind stay far from its concealed lair._

_Yet, human people have been excluded from this joyful fate,  
because the Evil won't lie far from their impure heart,  
and who doesn't go down might also not go up._

"Nice one!" exclaimed the charmed Kiriko, when she had finished "Have you been the one composing it?"

"Nope. It comes from... a friend."

"And who is she?"

"Maybe I will tell you, one day." Rika smiled again, and she stood up from the stairs of the Shrine. Hence, she added: "Shall we go? We're done here."

And they both left the place, accompanied by the singing of the cicadas, and pointing at the direction where the Sun was rising.

...

_The End._

...

**__****Author's last note: Firstly, thanks for reading all of this. I didn't want to release this epilogue so late, but I had had a bad toothache (dammit). Anyways, I am proud of finishing it, I know there are works which ar better than mine, out there, but indeed this is the one I did, and I am happy for completing it. You appreciate better the others' efforts, when you know how difficult it is.**

**__****Secondly... 350k words... and there have also been deleted parts, in addition to sections of the plot I fear not to have properly expanded (the relationships Rena-Daijiro and Goemon-Megumi, for example, but not only that...). I am making also an Italian translation, and I am taking advantage of it to make a better proofreading of the English one and to add some little new scene here and there, but nothing worthy of a rewrite or such stuff (I am not that good)**

**__****Finally, I don't think I will write other long sagas like this one... I guess I'm going to rather focus on shorter works.**

**__****Thanks again, and see you soon.**


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